Preliminary talks held on Malay unity summit

Preliminary talks held on Malay unity summit

KUALA LUMPUR (AP); Officials from Malaysia's ruling party and
its largest opposition group met on Thursday for the first time
in 15 years for preliminary talks on how to bridge rifts between
ethnic Muslim Malays, the country's largest and predominant
community.

Representatives from Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's United
Malays National Organization and the fundamentalist Pan-Malaysian
Islamic Party, PAS, met for four hours to try to set an agenda
for possible future talks between party leaders.

Officials who left the meeting did not announce its outcome,
but PAS Secretary-general Nasharuddin Mat Isa said there was
"positive hope" for future talks, which could include Mahathir.

UMNO has cautiously been courting PAS since it made
significant gains into the Malay Muslim vote, Mahathir's
traditional powerbase, in elections in 1999, forcing the prime
minister to rely on the support of non-Malay parties in the
governing coalition to retain two-thirds majority support in
Parliament.

Nasharuddin and Khalil Yaakob, who led the UMNO delegation,
fronted news media after Thursday's meeting, smiling and posing
together for photographers.

But both men ignored reporters' questions about whether future
talks would cover issues such as corruption, judicial
independence, human rights and police brutality, which PAS has
earlier demanded be on the agenda.

Support for Mahathir among ethnic Malay Muslims has waned
partly out of sympathy for Anwar Ibrahim, who was sacked as
deputy premier in 1998 and is now serving 15 years in prison
after being convicted of corruption and sodomy charges he insists
resulted from a political conspiracy.

In the 1999 elections, PAS won control of two of Malaysia's 13
states, tripled its seats in Parliament and made inroads in
several Malay-dominated provinces.

Mahathir blamed the gains on PAS' Muslim agenda and accused it
of abusing Islam to woo political support. PAS said the
government's treatment of Anwar and alleged rampant corruption
caused Malays to shun UMNO.

Delegations from both parties last met in 1985 to prepare for
a debate on Islam and Malay rights. The debate was called off
after Malaysia's Malay ruler intervened, saying it would threaten
the country's security.

On Thursday, Anwar accused two senior Malaysian prison
officials of illegally searching his hospital room and stealing
important legal and medical files, his lawyer said on Thursday.

The ousted deputy premier claimed that authorities raided his
room at the Kuala Lumpur General Hospital without his knowledge
on Dec. 20 while he was at another facility for a medical scan,
attorney Sankara Nair said.

In a two-page, handwritten police report obtained by The
Associated Press, Anwar said that when he returned to his room,
his wife's cellphone and several classified medical documents
were gone.

Also allegedly missing were Anwar's private notes on his
appeal to the Federal Court, Malaysia's highest court, against
his conviction and six-year prison sentence for corruption.