Estrada threatens to boycott APEC summit
Estrada threatens to boycott APEC summit
MANILA (Agencies): Philippines President Joseph Estrada on Thursday threatened to boycott next month's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Malaysia, citing the treatment meted out to jailed former deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim.
Estrada made the remarks during a call at the presidential palace by officers of the 365 Club, an informal group of journalists and newspaper columnists.
"I'm thinking of not going to Malaysia because they put my good friend Anwar behind bars," Estrada said, according to a journalist who attended the meeting.
Anwar, the former heir apparent sacked by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad last month, is in detention under a tough emergency law for corruption and sodomy. He claimed he was severely beaten while in police custody.
However, Press Secretary Rodolfo Reyes later tried to put the statement in context, saying Estrada was merely expressing a "personal" opinion and would not make public statements that could antagonize a fellow head of government in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
The ASEAN -- grouping the Philippines, Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam -- makes up the core of APEC, which also includes other Pacific basin nations like the United States, Japan and Canada.
Reyes insisted that as far as the Philippine government was concerned, Estrada would attend the APEC meeting, but added the internal situation there could change this.
"It depends on developments in Malaysia. Official word though from Malaysia are that the APEC summit is going ahead," Reyes said.
Reyes insisted Thursday that Estrada's comments were "not for public consumption."
Still, Estrada's remarks broke a deafening silence on Anwar's plight from ASEAN, which has jealously guarded a policy of non- interference in each other's internal affairs.
During an ASEAN foreign ministers' meeting in Manila in July, Thailand and the Philippines came under heavy fire for proposing a shift from the tradition to "flexible engagement" that would allow comment on internal policies which would impact on the region as a whole.
Fellow APEC member Canada's finance minister, Paul Martin, pledged Monday to raise the plight of Anwar during a meeting of Commonwealth finance ministers in Ottawa this week.
Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy also called on Malaysia to release Anwar and all those detained under the country's draconian Internal Security Act, which provides for indefinite detention without trial.
Human rights
In Bangkok an Asian human rights group on Thursday called for the release of Malaysia's former deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim and his supporters arrested last month.
FORUM-ASIA, a network of regional non-government organizations with its headquarters here, issued the call in a letter to Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.
The letter, delivered to the Malaysian embassy here, also expressed concern over alleged police brutality.
"We urge you to immediately release him from detention under the Internal Security Act and to allow him to exercise his right to due process," the letter said.
"We feel that Malaysia, as one of the leading countries in the ASEAN community should show an example of a civilized nation, one that treats its citizens with dignity and basic rights," it said.
The group on Monday blasted Mahathir's human rights record, accusing him of creating a "climate of fear" in Malaysia in an effort to crush all opposition.
FORUM-ASIA said a team of its experts had visited Malaysia from September 24-27.
It said the security act resulted in "violations like arbitrary arrest, detention, torture, illegal search and entry (and) not allowing families and lawyers to have access to detainees."
The team met with families of those detained, including Anwar's wife Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, whom they said was under "virtual house arrest."
In a related development, Malaysian police traveled to Singapore on Thursday to interview journalists about how they obtained interviews with jailed politician Anwar Ibrahim and his wife.
"They had a list of questions wanting us to characterize the interviews and how we obtained them," said Chris Blackman, vice president of news programming for CNBC Asia, a regional television network. "We said we were not going to comment on any of our news gathering."
Police are investigating a possible case of sedition against Anwar's wife, Azizah Ismail, because of her Sept. 21 interview with CNBC. She had expressed fears for her husband's health and mentioned rumors that police might infect him with the HIV virus to prove allegations of homosexuality.
On Thursday, police summoned Azizah for the third time to headquarters to question her about the comments. She described it as "harassment and persecution."
Her lawyer Sivarasa Rasiah said he also was questioned.