Malaysia police to quiz opposition over clash toll

Malaysia police to quiz opposition over clash toll

KUALA LUMPUR (Agencies): Malaysian police said on Wednesday
they would question government critics over their allegations
that the number of dead following weekend clashes between ethnic
Malays and Indians exceeded official account.

The national Bernama news agency quoted Selangor state police
chief Nik Ismail Nik Yusoff as saying that he had lodged a police
report against two opposition parties and outspoken Internet
service malaysiakini.com over the allegations.

Nik Ismail said the two parties -- Parti Islam se-Malaysia
(PAS) and Parti Keadilan Nasional -- had been distributing
pamphlets disputing the death toll, which police put at six.

Malaysiakini, a local news portal, on Tuesday quoted unnamed
hospital sources and family members as saying that the death toll
in Malaysia's worst racial violence in 32 years could be higher
than six, although it gave no figures of its own.

Malaysiakini editor Steven Gan said the story it put was based
on a press statement by the four-party opposition Barisan
Alternatif front, which PAS and Keadilan are also members.

"We haven't received any visit from the police yet," Gan told
Reuters.

Officials from the opposition front said they had no immediate
comment.

Nik Ismail said police arrested four people late on Tuesday
following a clash at a Hindu temple near the troubled Taman
Desaria neighborhood of Petaling Jaya.

This brought the total apprehended to 171 people. Another 53
people detained earlier in the connection with the clashes had
been released.

Among those arrested included two for suspected rumor-
mongering. The remaining could be charged with illegal assembly
and possession of weapons.

Nik Ismail said 25 people were still in hospital on Wednesday,
being treated for wounds sustained earlier.

He said while calm had returned to the troubled areas, police
had to continue battling rumors which "created an atmosphere of
fright among the people".

Police have warned that rumor-mongers could be charged under
the country's tough Internal Security Act which allows for
detention without trial.

Groups wielding stocks, machetes and pipes roamed the Taman
Desaria neighborhood, known for its violent crime and gangs, at
the height of the violence.

The clashes between members of the two ethnic groups was
sparked by a row involving a Malay wedding party and a Hindu
funeral procession.

Four Indians, a Malay and an Indonesian died in the fighting.
Most victims were hacked or bludgeoned to death.

The poor area is divided into pockets of almost exclusively
Indian and Malay communities.

Indians make up just eight percent of Malaysia's 22 million
people, Chinese 30 percent and Malays and other indigenous people
make up the rest.

While Indians are well represented in the professional
classes, they are also among the poorest and most marginalised.

In a related development, Malaysian authorities have announced
plans to build 5,000 low-cost homes to rehouse squatters in a
run-down district where the country's worst ethnic clashes for
decades broke out.

Mohamed Khir Toyo, chief minister of the central state of
Selangor, late Tuesday announced plans to build the new homes in
Taman Medan, a poor district of Petaling Jaya town west of Kuala
Lumpur.

He said the state government would build the homes to end the
squatter problem in the area, where there were some 6,000
squatter families.