KUALA LUMPUR: The boundary alignment between Malaysia and Indonesia is guided by established conventions and treaties governing the international land border between the two countries, says Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.
The Prime Minister said the determination of land boundary, including three villages in Nunukan, North Kalimantan, was not based on compensation, reciprocity or considerations of gain and loss, rejecting claims to the contrary.
“The basis for determining Malaysia’s international land boundary with Indonesia rests on two conventions and one agreement,” he said during a special briefing on the Malaysia-Indonesia border alignment issue in the Dewan Rakyat on Wednesday (Feb 4).
He added that the primary reference was the 1891 Boundary Convention between the British and Dutch governments covering Sabah and Sarawak.
For Sabah, he said the boundary was governed by agreements between the British and Dutch administrations, while a small sector in Sarawak was determined under the Boundary Convention signed in The Hague on March 26, 1928.
His remarks followed reports alleging Malaysia had ceded 5,207 hectares of land to Indonesia as compensation for three villages in the Nunukan area near the Sabah-Kalimantan border.
Malaysia’s Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Ministry has previously said the reports were inaccurate.
Anwar said the disputed areas fell under what were classified as Outstanding Boundary Problems (OBPs), which had not previously been finalised by either country and therefore could not be regarded as the sovereign territory of either Malaysia or Indonesia until joint verification was completed.
He said joint demarcation, investigation and measurement work by Malaysian and Indonesian officials began in 1977 and had been carried out in stages over several decades, involving repeated field surveys and technical verification based on agreed historical maps and river reference points.
According to Anwar, the Sabah-North Kalimantan sector was among the areas that had since been finalised, including OBPs at Pulau Sebatik and the Sungai Sinapat-Sungai Sesai sector, following joint surveys conducted between 2019 and 2023.
He said representatives from the Sabah state government, including the Chief Minister’s Office, State Legal Adviser, Lands and Surveys Department and other relevant agencies, were fully involved throughout the negotiation and verification process before any findings were endorsed at the federal level.
Anwar added that several other boundary matters remain unresolved, including intertidal areas in the Sabah-North Kalimantan sector and four OBPs in the Sarawak-West Kalimantan sector, which are still under negotiation between the two countries.
He stressed that any agreement reached at the negotiation stage would still have to go through domestic legal processes, including consultations with state governments, state legislative assemblies and the Conference of Rulers, before being formally concluded.
Anwar urged lawmakers to approach discussions on border issues with restraint, saying sensitive matters involving national sovereignty should not be politicised in a way that could undermine Malaysia’s long-standing relations with Indonesia.
