A group of Malaysian lawyers demanding affirmative action for the nation's ethnic Indians vowed yesterday to sue top police and legal officials who claimed it had ties to terrorists.
Malaysia has tried to paint the group, the Hindu Rights Action Force, or Hindraf, in terrorist colors after it organized a rare protest by 10,000 ethnic Indians last month. Malaysia's police chief said it was trying to provoke racial clashes.
But Hindraf dismissed the accusation as ridiculous, saying it was pursuing its objectives by legal, peaceful means.
"They're bankrupt of ideas to punish us," the group's legal adviser, P. Uthayakumar, said.
"They've no more bullets to fire so they're firing this at us. It's like killing a fly with a sledgehammer, because we're so small," he said.
Multiracial Malaysia has brushed aside claims that it has mistreated its ethnic Indians, saying they are better off than those still at home.
But ethnic Indians, who make up about 7 percent of a population of roughly 26 million, complain of a lack of educational and business opportunities, saying government affirmative-action policies that favor majority ethnic Malays have marginalized them.
Police chief Musa Hassan on Thursday accused Hindraf of seeking assistance from terrorist groups.
"Of late there have been indications that Hindraf is trying to seek support and help from terrorist groups," Musa told state news agency Bernama. "The police are concerned over Hindraf's activities and will not hesitate to take harsh action to guarantee the nation's peace and security."
Uthayakumar said Musa's remarks echoed courtroom comments by Attorney-General Abdul Gani Patail linking the group to Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels, and dared both officials to produce evidence of their claims.
Meanwhile, Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi defended a crackdown on recent anti-government protests, including by ethnic minority Indians, saying he would not tolerate people who incite violence for "personal gains."
In an opinion piece published yesterday in the Asian Wall Street Journal, Abdullah wrote that "the right to protest is fundamental, but it is a right that must be matched by a responsibility to respect general public safety."
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese