Reuters
Police cracked down on global Islamic group Ikhwan in September amid allegations of widespread child sexual abuse
Members of a Malaysian religious group accused of human trafficking and child sexual abuse continued to commit crimes even after a large-scale police crackdown, authorities say.
The Ikhwan Global Islamic Group (GISB) made international headlines in September after police rescued 402 minors suspected of abuse from 20 nursing homes.
Authorities arrested 171 suspects at the time, including teachers and guards, but hundreds more have since been arrested as new details emerge about the group's alleged crimes.
These include allegations that, until October 1, five GISB members trafficked people for exploitation through forced labor, through threats.
Warning: This story contains descriptions of sexual and physical violence.
Two of the accused were managers of a GISB-owned resort in the southern state of Johor. They were charged Sunday with four counts of human trafficking involving three women and a man aged 30 to 57. The third, an employee of the same complex, was charged with two counts of sexual abuse of a 16-year-old girl.
At least two other suspects in this incident, which occurred between August 2023 and October 1, 2024, remain at large.
Hundreds of other victims, aged between one and 17, are said to have suffered various forms of abuse in GISB-linked care homes, with some allegedly sodomized by their guardians and forced to perform sexual acts on other children, according to police.
At a press conference on Monday, lawyers representing GISB denied allegations of illegal business activities and organized crime, calling for a “fair investigation” as police investigations continue.
However, its CEO, Nasiruddin Mohd Ali, had earlier admitted that there were “one or two cases of sodomy” in nursing homes.
“Indeed, there were one or two cases of sodomy, but why group them all together?” » Nasiruddin said in a video posted on the company's Facebook page.
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Hundreds of victims, aged between 1 and 17, are said to have suffered various forms of abuse in GISB-linked care homes.
GISB has hundreds of companies in 20 countries, operating in sectors such as hospitality, food and education. He has also been linked to Al-Arqam, a religious sect banned by the Malaysian government in 1994 due to concerns about deviant Islamic teachings.
Khaulah Ashaari, the daughter of Al-Arqam founder Ashaari Muhammad, is a member of GISB and has denied that the group still follows her late father's teachings.
Malaysia's lower house of parliament passed a special motion on GISB-related issues on Tuesday, in which government ministers flagged a number of findings made since the children were rescued from nursing homes last month.
Home Minister Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail told the hearing that some children as young as two years old had been separated from their families and assigned to work under the pretext of “practical training”.
He also said they were sometimes forced to perform hundreds of squats as punishment for “failures of discipline.”
“If they committed wrongdoing, for something as simple as not queuing properly, they would be punished not with 100 but with 500 ketuk ketampi (squats),” Saifuddin said, according to a report from the local newspaper The Star.
“According to assessments carried out by psychologists – either by the D11 unit of the police or by the Department of Social Welfare – these children were missing their parents,” he added. “Some don’t even know them.”
To date, the police operation against GISB has resulted in 415 arrests and the rescue of 625 children, according to Saifuddin.
Malaysian authorities have also expanded their GISB investigations internationally, seeking help from Interpol.
Visit BBC Action Line for details of organizations that can provide advice, information and support to people affected by sexual abuse.
