🚀 go-pugleaf

Bernama reports:

> *   KUALA LUMPUR: Datuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamad said the action
>by certain groups in organising the Second Asia-Pacific
>Conference on East Timor recently was aimed at embarassing
>Malaysia besides straining Kuala Lumpur-Jakarta relations.
> *   The Prime Minister said the move by non-governmental
>organisations (NGOs) in organising the Conference on Nov 9 was
>not to help the people in East Timor.
> *   "Are they certain that by holding the conference East Timor
>would be independent?" he asked.
> *   "There is no possibility...(the Conference was being held)
>merely to embarass us because it will strain relations between
>Malaysia and Indonesia," he said.
> *   He was commenting on the involvement of the Youth wings of
>Umno, MCA and MIC in the Malaysian Peoples Action Front (MAF)
>which demonstrated against the conference and prevented it from
>being held. -- Bernama

As usual Mahathir is the master of the irrelevant. It matters not one
atom's weight whether or not holding the conference could help bring
independence to East Timor. The fact remains that it was perfectly well
within the bounds of Malaysian law for the conference participants to meet
peacefully behind closed doors on private property, no matter how much the
government or anyone else might prefer that they not do so. What was *not*
within the bounds of Malaysian law was for a group of thugs to hold an
illegal gathering on the street outside, to storm the conference venue, to
damage private property, and to assault the participants. What was also
*not* within the bounds of Malaysian law was for the police to ignore the
illegal activities of those thugs because they happened to be BN members
acting under orders from their party leaders and instead to detain for
several days people who had broken no law. But will we ever hear Mahathir
the hypocrite even *admit* any of this, much less do something to correct
it? I won't be holding my breath.


_____

Faruq abd ul-Rafi (R. A. Nelson)
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Philosophy
E-mail: faruq@uiuc.edu, faruq@prairienet.org