Malaysia sends Indonesia teacher to camp
Malaysia sends Indonesia teacher to camp
KUALA LUMPUR (Agencies): The Malaysian government has ordered
an Islamic teacher from Indonesia to be held without trial for
two years at a prison camp for alleged involvement in a local
militant group, police said on Friday.
The order was the latest step in a crackdown by Malaysian
authorities against what they have described as a militant group
waging a campaign of murder, robbery and attacks on churches and
temples as part of a campaign for a hard-line Islamic state.
Meanwhile, news reports on Friday said that a local university
had uncovered an Islamic movement trying to influence its
students to start a holy war against Malaysia's secular
government.
Malaysia has drawn connections between home-grown militants
and extremists in neighboring Indonesia, where four Malaysians
are said to have been involved in the bombing of a shopping mall
and churches and in sectarian fighting against Christians.
A police spokesman told The Associated Press on customary
condition of anonymity that Mohamad Iqbal Rahman was sent to the
Kamunting prison camp in northern Malaysia this week to serve a
detention order of at least two years under Malaysia's Internal
Security Act.
Mohamad, who has permanent resident status in Malaysia, had
been in custody since June 30, when he was detained after
delivering a religious talk in Shah Alam, near Kuala Lumpur.
Several others suspected militants, including members of the
fundamentalist opposition Pan-Malaysian Islamic party, are also
being held since their arrest under the internal security laws
over the past month.
Lawyers are mounting a legal battle to free them, saying the
detentions were unconstitutional. The Internal Security Act,
created to fight a communist rebellion in the 1950s, allows for
indefinite detention without trial.
The Islamic party, the biggest opposition group in the
country, accuses Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's government of
trying to damage its reputation and derail the party's efforts to
roll back a recent ban on outdoor gatherings.
Authorities say the so-called Mujahidin Militant Group is led
by the son of the Islamic party's spiritual leader.
Malay Muslims comprise more than 60 percent of Malaysia's 23
million people, and sizable Chinese and Indian minorities make up
the rest. The government, which emphasizes national economic
development, tries to balance the interests of the groups.
The governing parties retained power in elections in 1999 but
lost support, especially to the fundamentalist party.
News service
In a related development, a new independent news service is
challenging Malaysia's tight grip on the media by publishing on
the Internet and broadcasting via radio stations in Indonesia.
RadiqRadio.com bypasses broadcasting rules because it is
transmitted to Malaysia from stations in neighboring Indonesia,
which take the stories from the service's Internet site, two
founders said on Friday.
The strategy means the station does not need to apply for a
broadcasting license from the Malaysian government, which closely
controls the electronic and print media.
The country's best-known independent news voice,
Malaysiakini.com, also operates without state permission because
of a technicality -- Internet sites do not require the
publication license that newspapers must renew annually.
"I don't think it would be correct to say that we are
cynically exploiting the loophole provided by the Internet,"
RadiqRadio editorial board member Kean Wong told Reuters.
"It's really an opportunity for Malaysians to be heard, to
have a voice. When we report on rural issues you will hear rural
people's voices not a journalist pontificating on rural people."
RadiqRadio, which "aired" in June and will launch officially
on Sept. 8, is run by the local Center for Investigative
Journalism and funded entirely by 68H, an independent Indonesian
news service that supplies content to 200 stations, said Wong.