A LETTER FROM EUROPE

From Europe, where I get news from home on the internet, I think the priorities are wrong. A poor mother gets Aids in the hospital and it is all over the front pages. But a man is arrested in his home without a warrant. His house is illegally ransacked by the police. He is taken at midnight to the police station. Instead of being released in 24 hours, as the law requires, he is held without bail or a lawyer for 18 days, and then a note is given by the police to a relative that he is dead, and his body is at some hospital margue.

When the family finally finds the body, it is black and blue from torture. Then it comes out that this man has been a member of an opposition party, and that this is the reason for his detention.

There is no news coverage until the widow files a civil action. There is no investigation. No police are questioned. No charges are filed in this death by police brutality. The government is silent. The Home Minister who dirests the police says nothing. The Attorney-General, who is supposed to investigate all suspicious deaths, especially when they occur in police custody, does nothing. The Prime Minister says nothing. The Minister for Justice, Rais Yatim, does nothing.

What is wrong in Malaysia? Clearly the priorities are out of line.

Zul Ahmad