KUALA LUMPUR, July 1 — Home Minister Senator Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail today said the government was unable to ratify the United Nations Convention Against Torture (UNCAT) due to its conflict with local laws.

He said the ratification would require Malaysia to ensure that the country’s laws did not have provisions for punishments that could cause severe pain.

"To ratify UNCAT, our laws cannot have the element of causing severe pain, and if we do ratify UNCAT, it means that we have to repeal some of our laws, so for now it’s a ‘no’,” Saifuddin told Parliament during his winding-up speech for the debate on the National Human Rights Commission’s (Suhakam) annual report from year 2022 to 2023, today.

Saifuddin was responding to Shah Alam MP Azli Yusof, who asked about the government’s decision on ratifying the UNCAT.

In January, Suhakam commissioner Tengku Mohamed Fauzi Tengku Abdul Hamid had criticised the government for the delay in ratifying the convention.

Malaysia and Singapore are among countries that are yet to join the 173 others that have already ratified the UNCAT.