96% of missing children cases solved since 2020

KUALA LUMPUR: Police have successfully resolved 96% of missing children cases since 2020, Dewan Rakyat was told.

Home Minister Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail said that 74% of the total 3,847 missing children cases from 2020 until September were girls.

“On average, a total of 770 cases of missing children were recorded annually or two cases daily.

“However, out of the total missing children cases, 96% of them were resolved by the police,” he said during the Minister’s Question Time on Thursday (Oct 17).

Saifuddin was responding to a question by Muhammad Ismi Mat Taib (PN-Parit) who had asked about efforts undertaken by the ministry to address the increasing number of missing children cases.

The minister also said that children aged 13 until 15 were the most missing, constituting 54% of the total missing cases, while 37% of the total cases involved children aged 16 until 18.

“Among the reasons that the children went missing included seeking freedom, peer influence and misunderstandings with family,” said Saifuddin.

He said that while a total of 457 awareness programmes were held as a prevention measure, the authorities would activate Nur Alerts when children went missing to expand search efforts.

He added that once the children were found, psychological support would be provided for the family and victims.

When asked about the need to draft new laws to curb the issue, Saifuddin said that existing legal frameworks could deal with the problem adequately.

“The existing laws are enough, as we found the missing child and profiled them, the case tends to change to rape cases under Section 306 and 305 of the Penal Code, but murder cases were very minimal.

“Most cases were due to peer influence where these children would run away to be free, with their friends or lovers. Looking at the data, if this happened and when the child is reported missing, we find that we needed to open case files for rape,” he said, adding that the government would put more emphasis on awareness.