Chapter 1 – Report of the Policy, Law and Complaints Group On 8 July, the Commission received another memorandum from Kesatuan Mahasiswa Malaysia regarding the then ongoing disciplinary actions against two students of IIUM and several students of the National University of Malaysia (UKM). The two students of IIUM were charged with organising a forum on the goods and services tax (GST) in the university which was attended by a Member of Parliament from an opposition party, while the UKM students were charged for holding a sit-in protest in front of the UKM Chancellor’s office on the issue of shortage of water supply. In this regard, the Commission recommends that Section 16 of the UUCA44 be reviewed and amended to require all universities to take into consideration the fundamental rights of their students when enacting or enforcing rules within their campuses. More specifically, universities must ensure that the enforcement of their rules does not curtail the basic rights of students, including the right to information, to discuss national and international issues, as well as to express their opinions on any issue in the true spirit of democracy. The Commission also calls upon the students to give full cooperation to university administration bodies in their efforts to make campuses better centres for intellectual development. (d) Complaints Pertaining to Asylum Seekers’ and Refugees’ Matters Article 14 of the UDHR guarantees the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. Although Malaysia is not a signatory State to the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees 1951 and its 1967 New York Protocol, Malaysia has had a good working relation with the Office of the UNHCR on humanitarian grounds since 1975. Malaysian law does not have any provisions that distinguish between refugees and undocumented migrants. As a result, asylum-seekers and refugees, in particular those who are not yet registered by UNHCR, remain vulnerable to arrest for immigration offences and may be subject to repeated arrests, detention, and charges on immigration offences which may carry sentences of imprisonment and/or whipping. That said, the Commission takes cognisant of the administrative arrangement between the Government and UNHCR, where a directive has been issued to provide guidance to the 44 Section 16C of the Universities and University Colleges Act 1971: (1) The Board shall have the power to make such disciplinary rules as it deems necessary or expedient to provide for the discipline of the students of the University; the disciplinary rules made under this subsection shall be published in the Gazette. (2) The disciplinary rules made under this section may include provisions for the suspension of a student of the University during the pendency of disciplinary proceedings. (3) The disciplinary rules made under this section shall create such disciplinary offences and provide for such disciplinary punishments as the Board may deem appropriate, and the punishments so provided may extend to expulsion of the student from the University. (4) The disciplinary rules made under this section shall prescribe the procedures for disciplinary proceedings and disciplinary appeal proceedings. (5) The particularity of the matters referred to in subsections (2), (3) and (4) shall be without prejudice to the generality of the powers of the Board under subsection (1). 90 BOOK-ANR2016-01-latest.indb 90 08/04/2016 3:32 PM