Gathering FROM PAST EXPERIENCE ,
Years ago, diplomatic efforts to return Farik and Nazir began, according to a report from 2009, when then-foreign secretary Rais Yatim claimed to have requested their return.
Malaysia is no stranger to bringing back its residents who have defected for reasons connected to violence or militancy and putting them through treatment after their return.
After the Islamic State ( IS ) militant group declared a caliphate in 2014, a large number of citizens from Southeast Asia began to travel to Syria and Iraq.  ,
According to Ahmad El-Muhammady of the International Islamic University Malaysia in a policy brief for the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism think tank next year, approximately 122 Malay traveled to Syria and Iraq from 2011 to 2014.
After IS ‘ fall, Malaysia’s work to return those who had gone there to battle, as well as their people, faced protests due to fears it would harm public health and national security, Ahmad noted in his report titled” Managing the Returning Foreign Terrorist Fighters and Their Families: Malaysian Knowledge”.
Before the procedure was suspended, he wrote, Malaysian government effectively repatriated 16 people despite their intention to return as many people as feasible.  ,
Reasons for the suspension include doubts from future returnees, the state losing touch with some of them following the US’s departure from northern Syria, and issue among officials over working with a non-state artist in charge of the camps it.
From that experience, Ahmad wrote there is a need for “holistic assessment” of foreign-trained fighters and their families, collaboration between the authorities and civil society organisations in reintegration efforts, and education opportunities for detainees and their families.
Aizat and the government both agreed that a comprehensive and long-term rehabilitation and reintegration program must be put in place.  ,
He argued that the men must be given the opportunity to re-enter society through employment opportunities and active social life, just like they are for all citizens.
” This reintegration must take place under strict supervision by the authorities. Without such efforts, the risk of reoffending or returning to violent extremism significantly increases”, he added.
” With proper support and reintegration, they can transform into individuals who contribute positively to the nation”.
He claimed that in order to address the root causes of their behavior, authorities must appoint qualified experts in fields like psychology and criminology.
” This cannot be a one-time endeavor or excessively dependent on theological correction alone,” he said. He said it should focus on the psychological issues and complaints of these two former high-value detainees because of their previous abuse and radicalization at the Guantanamo detention facility.  ,
Farik has for example sketched the various forms of torture that he allegedly experienced while being interrogated at Guantanamo and that he submitted as part of his mitigation defense.
Before being transferred to Guantanamo Bay in 2006, he and Nazir were detained in Thailand in 2003 and placed in solitary confinement at a covert location run by the US Central Intelligence Agency ( CIA ).
The US Defense Department stated in a statement on December 18 that it was “responsibly” reducing the detainee population and ultimately closing the Guantanamo Bay facility.
It said 27 detainees remain there: 15 are eligible for transfer, three are eligible for a Periodic Review Board, seven are involved in the military commissions process, and two detainees have been convicted and sentenced by military commissions.
Since starting operations in 2002, the detention facility has seen about 780 detainees, with 753 of those being transferred, and is notorious for its torture allegations.  ,
There is a need to trust the rehabilitation process for the repatriated Malaysian duo, according to criminologist Haezreena Begum Abdul Hamid of Universiti Malaya ( UM).  ,
” They are being monitored by the police, therefore I don’t think there’s much to worry about”, she said.  ,
More than anything, I worry about how vulnerable they are and how many people would want to approach them.
Added Haezreena, who works on deradicalisation cases:” We might get people who want to hail them as heroes, we might get researchers who want to get their narratives, media who want stories that might make them feel stressed and suffocated”.
Law enforcement personnel and experts must be permitted to perform their duties, she said, and confidentiality is important.  ,
” You don’t know what they are facing, whatever experiences they went through at one of the harshest prisons in the world, PTSD– you should think of them as human beings”, she said, using the acronym for post-traumatic stress disorder.
On December 18, Malaysia’s inspector general of police Razarudin Husain updated the men by saying:” Both individuals were received in good and healthy condition. They are extremely appreciative of their families ‘ reunification in their home.