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While doing some fact-checking for a recent story on Malaysian terror suspects in Guantanamo, I checked out the US Central Intelligence Agency website’s country profiles.

I was keen to see how Malaysia is viewed by arguably the world’s foremost spy agency and by extension, the US government itself.

Governments around the world do not take the CIA findings lightly. Foreign investors doing due diligence on whether to invest in a certain country will take into account the CIA’s “pronouncements” of that country, and Malaysia is no exception to this mode of assessment.

I was in for a rude shock after reading how the CIA’s World Factbook rated the country in its Transnational Issues section. It was a damning report, albeit a blatant generalisation of the nation.

However, the report also carried some harsh truths.

Under the “current situation” of Malaysia’s status which was last updated on April 30 this year, it said:

“Malaysia is a destination and, to a lesser extent, a source and transit country for men, women and children subjected to forced labour, and women and children subjected to sex trafficking; Malaysia is mainly a destination country for foreign workers who migrate willingly from countries, including Indonesia, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Nepal, Burma, and other Southeast Asian countries, but subsequently encounter forced labour or debt bondage in agriculture, construction, factories and domestic service at the hands of employers, employment agents and labour recruiters; women from Southeast Asia and, to a much lesser extent, Africa, are recruited for legal work in restaurants, hotels and salons but are forced into prostitution; refugees, including Rohingya adults and children, are not legally permitted to work and are vulnerable to trafficking; a small number of Malaysians are trafficked internally and subjected to sex trafficking abroad.”

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