Malaysia Faces Criticism Over Homeless Roundups Before ASEAN Summit

545 people picked up as Kuala Lumpur prepares for visiting leaders

Malaysian authorities have picked up around 545 people, including 180 foreigners, since February as Kuala Lumpur prepares to host next week's ASEAN summit. An operation before dawn on Thursday brought another 101 people to a city transit center for homeless people, sharpening criticism of efforts to clear central streets before an international gathering.

Bukit Bintang, Masjid Jamek and Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman are among the areas targeted. All are within a few kilometers of the conference venue. Officials describe the operations as rescue missions intended to protect people living on the streets, address safety and public health concerns, and present a welcoming image to visiting leaders.

Volunteer groups running soup kitchens and outreach services describe a different consequence: people are moved away from the places where they receive meals, medicine and basic support. Critics say the operations repeat a familiar pattern before major events, removing visible homelessness without resolving why people have no secure place to live.

Kuala Lumpur's immediate preparations involve motorcades, hundreds of delegates and intense attention to its central districts. Social workers and advocates want the response to extend beyond summit week, with stable shelter, individual support and routes into housing and employment.

The central issue is what happens after a person leaves the sidewalk. A temporary bed can provide immediate relief. Keeping someone housed requires support that continues after the visiting leaders and cameras have gone.

How the street operations work

The current drive is called KL Strike Force Aktiviti Orang Papa dan Kanak Kanak, translated as activities concerning destitute persons and children. Teams from several agencies focus on places where sleeping on the street and informal encampments are common.

People encountered during the operations are transported to the Medan Tuanku Homeless Transit Centre in central Kuala Lumpur. Officials say the center offers shelter and basic services. Teams generally work in the early morning, when people sleeping outside are still in place.

Che Samsuzuki Che Noh, director of the Federal Territories Social Welfare Department, said the operation seeks to reduce risks faced by people on the streets while protecting Malaysia's image during international meetings. He described safety, health and the country's reputation as matters requiring action by several agencies:

This operation aims to foster a more conducive environment and safeguard the country's image in the eyes of the international community. In terms of food, clothing and basic needs, they are not neglected. But when it comes to safety, health and the country's image, these are aspects that must be addressed collectively.

People brought to the center may be checked for health needs and referred to welfare facilities. Some foreign nationals without documentation may instead be referred to immigration authorities. Officials say temporary shelter is intended to connect people with services, while outreach groups say many do not remain in facilities for long and eventually return to the streets.

A timeline stretching beyond summit week

Kuala Lumpur's disagreement over street homelessness predates the approaching summit. The current operations follow years of tension between efforts to control public spaces and the volunteer networks supporting people who live there.

• In 2014, a proposal to curtail soup kitchens near the city center prompted a public backlash and closer cooperation between authorities and civil society.
• Since February 2025, authorities say around 545 people, including 180 foreigners, have been picked up.
• Early Thursday, ahead of the summit, 101 people were brought to a city transit center.
• As of October 18, 2025, Kuala Lumpur was preparing to host the ASEAN summit the following week.

The 180 foreigners represent roughly one third of the 545 people authorities say have been picked up since February. Both Malaysians and foreign nationals therefore face the consequences of the operations, although their routes through welfare and immigration systems can differ.

The account of the operations gives no figures for how many people have secured lasting housing, stayed in welfare facilities or undergone immigration processing. Those outcomes matter to people seeking a stable place to live beyond the summit.

Who is affected, and where they may be sent

People affected include Malaysians who have slept on the streets for years and know outreach workers by name, as well as people recently left without housing after losing a job or being evicted. Some are migrants or refugees without steady employment or secure legal status.

Malaysia is not a party to the 1951 Refugee Convention. Refugees and asylum seekers can hold cards recognizing them through the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, while lacking formal legal protection under domestic law. For someone picked up without documentation, the next step may be immigration processing rather than access to social services.

Transit centers commonly provide beds, showers and basic meals. People assessed as needing longer support may be referred to welfare homes under the Destitute Persons Act 1977, often shortened to DPA.

The law allows authorities to remove a person from a public space and place them temporarily in a facility while social workers assess their circumstances. A magistrate can issue an order extending institutional care under certain conditions. In practical terms, the process can move someone from the street into a placement they have not freely chosen.

Rights advocates have criticized the DPA for decades, arguing that involuntary detention of people who have committed no crime violates basic liberties and can leave them in institutions with few ways out. Welfare agencies say their purpose is to stabilize people's circumstances and connect them with family, training or employment.

Many people living on the streets avoid longer placements because of curfews, restrictions and fears about losing the little independence they retain. Limited transitional housing, mental health care and employment programs can leave people returning to the same sidewalks when operations linked to an event end.

Why soup kitchens fear losing contact

Kuala Lumpur's volunteer networks have maintained nightly meal lines and outreach patrols for years. They cover gaps between limited shelter capacity and the daily needs of people without homes, including food, medicine and contact with people who can help.

Volunteers say operations during summit preparations disrupt predictable meal times and familiar meeting places. Those locations also allow outreach workers to find people for health checks or help them replace documents. Moving someone can interrupt several forms of assistance at once.

The 2014 dispute over soup kitchens led to closer cooperation between government agencies and civil society. Volunteers say that cooperation weakens when attention shifts toward managing the city's appearance for major events.

Volunteer groups want consistent funding for day centers, more storage for personal belongings and guaranteed routes into housing. Their concern is that a temporary bed with a checkout date can leave a person facing the same difficulties once the placement ends.

What street sweeps change, and why homelessness returns

Street sweeps can make a city look different for a week. The pressures that push people into homelessness, including eviction, job loss, untreated mental health conditions, addiction and family breakdown, require a longer response. Migrants and refugees can face additional barriers to work, services and secure accommodation.

Food lines and nightly shelters help people survive. Remaining housed requires somewhere to live and support that helps a person keep it. For someone dealing with illness, missing documents or unstable employment, a roof alone may leave important problems unresolved.

Public health research and city programs across the world have found that people leave street living at higher rates, and return less often, when they receive stable housing first with few entry barriers. Counseling, basic health care and help finding work are part of that approach.

Police operations can instead create repeated movement between streets and temporary facilities. People may lose contact with outreach workers, have belongings confiscated or damaged, and miss medical appointments or identification checks needed to obtain benefits.

Cities can keep sidewalks clearer more sustainably by expanding shelters that accept people as they are, placing case managers at facilities and linking outreach to guaranteed transitional or permanent housing. A case manager is a worker who helps coordinate a person's needs, such as treatment, documents and accommodation, rather than handling each problem separately.

These approaches can also reduce spending over time compared with repeated enforcement, detention and emergency medical care. Their practical aim is to replace recurring removals with a placement that lasts.

A regional pattern before major events

Host cities across Southeast Asia have repeatedly cleared sidewalks before summits and state visits. The pattern often involves operations arranged at short notice, transfers by bus to welfare centers and attention to central districts most visible to visitors.

Human rights groups have long argued that these actions criminalize poverty and move it out of sight. In other capitals, people detained during such operations have sometimes been sent to centers with limited resources, basic meals and beds, and few routes into employment or permanent housing. Some centers have faced allegations of abusive conditions.

Criticism often follows after an event finishes, yet similar operations recur when another international gathering approaches. Accounts from other Southeast Asian capitals describe detentions before events followed by quiet releases when public attention fades.

City leaders want order, lower crime and clean sidewalks. Residents want safe public spaces. People without housing need reliable access to food, hygiene and services, alongside a realistic route to a home. An operation timed around a summit rarely meets all those needs at once.

Repeated removals can damage trust between people living outside and the agencies that need to build relationships with them. Experience from cities that have reduced street homelessness points toward sustained investment rather than occasional sweeps.

Why the ASEAN summit adds pressure

Malaysia's position as host raises the stakes for Kuala Lumpur. The summit is expected to draw leaders and ministers from across Southeast Asia, alongside representatives of partner countries. Motorcades and delegations will make the capital's streets part of the international picture of the gathering.

Attention is especially intense amid disputes between major powers over trade rules and security, including tariff threats and export controls. Law enforcement action against cyber scamming networks in Southeast Asia, including prominent cases in Cambodia and Myanmar, is also attracting attention.

Diplomacy at the summit is likely to focus on regional growth, supply chains that can withstand disruption, and humanitarian crises, including the continuing emergency in Myanmar. Malaysian leaders have argued that a more active regional role can improve access for humanitarian assistance and the safety of aid workers.

The treatment of vulnerable people in Kuala Lumpur gives those diplomatic aims a domestic setting. Protecting people at home while maintaining orderly public spaces would support the country's message abroad. That connects the debate over street operations to Malaysia's wider presentation during the summit.

Practical alternatives for shelter and support

City officials have options to reduce visible street homelessness quickly while addressing the reasons people avoid shelters. Measures used in other cities depend on adequate funding, reliable staffing and checks on whether placements actually help people remain indoors.

Expanding shelter capacity around the clock, with fewer entry barriers, is one option. People may avoid facilities that separate couples, restrict belongings or impose strict entry conditions. Flexible spaces with storage, showers and clinics, even when opened temporarily, can encourage people to come inside and stay connected with services.

Dedicated case managers attached to shelter beds and outreach teams can help make that connection last. A familiar social worker and a guaranteed placement reduce repeated movement between the street and temporary accommodation.

Rapid access to documents and benefits would address another obstacle. Without identification, bank accounts or medical documents, people can struggle to obtain work or rent a room. Mobile registration units at transit centers could speed up the process of replacing or obtaining essential records.

Day centers in areas where people already gather could provide washing facilities, lockers, charging stations, quiet rooms and regular contact with counselors. Such facilities also offer a practical way to reduce friction between businesses, residents and people living outside.

How authorities and volunteers could coordinate

Soup kitchens and outreach groups already know where many people seek help. Clear protocols during summit week could allow authorities to plan activity around meal lines and outreach schedules, reducing disruption to food distribution and ongoing care.

A limited amnesty from detention for people engaged with services, paired with quicker referrals to shelter and treatment, is another proposed option. It would aim to keep sidewalks passable while preserving trust between vulnerable people and those helping them.

If authorities continue using the DPA, published criteria and time limits for placements would make the process easier to understand. Access to legal aid, contact with family and independent monitoring of welfare facilities would provide safeguards for people placed in care.

Malaysia could use the summit to demonstrate a different response from recurring removals. Expanding shelters people are willing to use, assigning case managers and securing actual housing placements would provide concrete examples of support while keeping public spaces orderly.

Measuring success after the motorcades leave

Regular public figures could show what happens to people after they are transported from the streets. Useful measures include how many accept shelter, how many enter welfare homes and how many obtain housing that lasts beyond a temporary stay.

Independent access to transit centers and welfare homes for Malaysia's human rights commission, legal aid groups and civic watchdogs would allow closer scrutiny of conditions and treatment. A public feedback channel for businesses, residents and people experiencing homelessness could identify problems early and reduce confrontation.

Officials argue that protecting the city's image requires visible action. A lasting improvement would come from fewer people sleeping outside because they have chosen to move indoors and can remain there, supported by housing, care and employment services.

Kuala Lumpur's test extends beyond the approaching summit. Stable placements would reduce the likelihood of the same people being collected from the same streets before the next major event.

What to Know

• Authorities say around 545 people, including 180 foreigners, have been picked up since February. Thursday's operation brought 101 people to a transit center.
• Operations have targeted Bukit Bintang, Masjid Jamek and Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman, near the summit venue.
• Officials cite safety, health and Malaysia's international image. Volunteers say removals disrupt meals, medical support and outreach.
• The Medan Tuanku Homeless Transit Centre provides temporary shelter and basic services. Some people may be referred to welfare homes or immigration authorities.
• The Destitute Persons Act 1977 permits placements in welfare facilities, including extensions ordered by a magistrate. Rights advocates criticize involuntary detention under the law.
• Foreign nationals without documents face particular risks. Malaysia has not joined the 1951 Refugee Convention.
• Proposed alternatives include flexible shelters, case managers, document services, day centers and guaranteed routes into housing.
• Public outcome figures and independent monitoring would help show whether support continues after summit week.