Pencuri itu berlari ke arah jalan.

In Malay, demonstratives like ini and itu usually come after the noun.

So:

• pencuri itu = that thief / the thief
• jalan itu = that road / the road

This is different from English, where we say that thief with that before the noun.

In this sentence, pencuri itu most naturally means the thief or that thief, depending on context.

It can mean any of those, depending on context.

Malay verbs do not usually change form for tense the way English verbs do. So berlari itself does not specifically mark past, present, or future.

For example, berlari could be understood as:

• runs
• is running
• ran
• will run

The time is normally understood from context or from time words such as:

• semalam = yesterday
• sekarang = now
• esok = tomorrow

So in your sentence, berlari simply gives the action to run.

The prefix ber- often forms an intransitive verb, meaning a verb that does not take a direct object.

So:

• lari = run / running / to run
• berlari = to run

In everyday Malay, lari and berlari can both appear, but berlari is a very normal and standard form for to run.

In this sentence, berlari means the thief was performing the action of running, without a direct object.

Ke arah means toward or in the direction of.

• ke = to
• arah = direction
• ke arah = toward / in the direction of

So:

• berlari ke jalan can suggest ran to the road
• berlari ke arah jalan more specifically suggests ran toward the road

That means the sentence focuses on direction, not necessarily arrival. The thief moved in the direction of the road.

No. Jalan is a very common Malay word with more than one use.

It can mean:

• road / street as a noun
• walk / go as a verb in some contexts

Here, it is clearly a noun meaning road or street, because it comes after ke arah.

So in this sentence, jalan does not mean to walk.

Malay does not use articles like a, an, and the in the same way English does.

A noun can often appear without any article:

• jalan = road / the road / a road

The exact meaning depends on context.

If the speaker wanted to make it more specific, they could say:

• jalan itu = that road / the road

But jalan by itself is perfectly normal.

It can mean both.

In Malay, itu often works like:

• that
• or a marker making the noun definite, similar to the

So pencuri itu may be translated as:

• that thief
• the thief

Which one sounds best depends on the context in English.

The basic root is curi, which means to steal.

With the prefix peN-, it becomes a noun for a person associated with the action:

• curi = steal
• pencuri = thief / stealer

So pencuri literally refers to a person who steals.

The word order is basically:

• pencuri itu = subject
• berlari = verb
• ke arah jalan = direction phrase

So the structure is:

Subject + Verb + Direction

This is very similar to natural English word order:

The thief + ran + toward the road

Not necessarily.

Because it says ke arah jalan, the meaning is toward the road or in the direction of the road.

That tells us the direction of movement, but it does not guarantee that the thief actually arrived there.

If Malay wanted to make arrival clearer, it might use a phrasing more like to the road rather than just toward the road.