The Orang Cocos are an ethnic group

Ethnic group

An ethnic group is a group of people whose members identify with each other, through a common heritage, often consisting of a common language, a common culture and/or an ideology that stresses common ancestry or endogamy...

 residing in Sabah

Sabah

Sabah is one of 13 member states of Malaysia. It is located on the northern portion of the island of Borneo. It is the second largest state in the country after Sarawak, which it borders on its southwest. It also shares a border with the province of East Kalimantan of Indonesia in the south...

, eastern Malaysia on the island of Borneo

Borneo

Borneo is the third largest island in the world and is located north of Java Island, Indonesia, at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia....

. They primarily reside in Kampung Cocos near Lahad Datu

Lahad Datu

Lahad Datu is a town and district located in Tawau Division, in the east of Sabah, eastern Malaysia on the island of Borneo. It occupies the peninsula on the north side of Darvel Bay. Its population was estimated to be around 118,000 in 1991 and 156,059 in the 2000 census. Lahad Datu is surrounded...

 in Tawau Division

Tawau Division

Tawau Division is one of the five administrative sub-divisions of Sabah, east Malaysia, on the island of Borneo. It occupies a total of 14,905 square kilometers or 20% of Sabah's territory...

. Originally from the Cocos (Keeling) Islands

Cocos (Keeling) Islands

The Territory of the Cocos Islands, also called Cocos Islands and Keeling Islands, is a territory of Australia, located in the Indian Ocean, southwest of Christmas Island and approximately midway between Australia and Sri Lanka....

 (now a territory of Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

), they settled this area in the 1950s. Their current population of around 4000 is about eight times larger than the population remaining in the Cocos Islands themselves. They are accorded bumiputra

Bumiputra

Bumiputera or Bumiputra is a Malay term widely used in Malaysia, embracing indigenous people of the Malay Archipelago. The term comes from the Sanskrit word bhumiputra, which can be translated literally as "son of land"...

 status by the government. Their language, a variant of standard Malay

Malay language

Malay is a major language of the Austronesian family. It is the official language of Malaysia , Indonesia , Brunei and Singapore...

, has the ISO designation of ISO 639-3

ISO 639-3

ISO 639-3:2007, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 3: Alpha-3 code for comprehensive coverage of languages, is an international standard for language codes in the ISO 639 series. The standard describes three‐letter codes for identifying languages. It extends the ISO 639-2...

coa.

External links

• http://www.regional.gov.au/territories/publications/files/A+Federation+in+These+Seas+Part+3.PDF
• http://www.theborneopost.com/2011/03/07/rtm-documenting-unique-culture-of-sabah-cocos-community/
• http://books.google.com/books?id=8CUuAAAAMAAJ&q=borneo+cocos+sabah&dq=borneo+cocos+sabah&hl=en
• http://books.google.com/books?id=glG-WBH8hkQC&pg=PA168&dq=borneo+cocos+sabah&hl=en
• http://books.google.com/books?id=fJceAAAAMAAJ&q=borneo+cocos+sabah&dq=borneo+cocos+sabah&hl=en