Malaysia's Islamic opposition party will organize training to help teen-agers drafted in a new national service program resist any attempts to indoctrinate them with pro-government rhetoric, officials said yesterday.
About 85,000 high school graduates born in 1986 have been called up for three months of physical training, community service and indoor classes on patriotism under Malaysia's first national service program. The first batch starts next month.
Authorities say the plan aims to boost racial integration and curb religious extremism among youths in mostly Muslim Malaysia. But the opposition fears the recruits might also be indoctrinated to support the government.
Salahuddin Ayub, youth chief of the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, said party members' children who have been selected for the program will undergo a course later this month in "facing various forms of indoctrination."
The course would encourage teenagers to reject tutelage that includes "adoration of government leaders," suspicion toward the opposition and teachings that disregard Islamic principles, Salahuddin said.
"We hope there will not be any indoctrination, but we must still be prepared for the worst," he said.
The training would be compulsory for young people affiliated with the party, and would not be open to anyone else.
Defense Minister Najib Razak said last weekend the government will "not have any political indoctrination for trainees," stressing that the program was meant to be "a tool for nation-building."
Despite the government's assurances, the Islamic party has identified more than 500 teenagers so far who will participate in its course, which would last at least one day at party centers nationwide, Salahuddin said.
The Islamic party poses the main threat to Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's ruling coalition in general elections expected later this year. It controls the governments of two of Malaysia's 13 states and helps set the tone of political debate among the Malay Muslim majority.
Government leaders have in the past accused the Islamic party of twisting religious principles for political profit and breeding extremism by preaching hatred against the government. In turn, the fundamentalists accuse Abdullah's party of shunning Islam's tenets and allowing cronyism and corruption to thrive.
Recruits for the national service program were chosen at random by computer from more than 480,000 boys and girls who turn 18 this year.
Males and females will have segregated living quarters, but would get the same training at dozens of camps nationwide, including outdoor activities such as marching, unarmed combat and emergency first aid, the government says.
Book classes will focus on subjects like national security, history and civic pride.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion