The United States-based Environment News Service accused
Malaysian government hackers of shutting down its website after it ran a story
on a new book implicating a senior politician in alleged graft."The attack on our site came from a Malaysian government entity as identified by their IP address," Sunny Lewis, editor-in-chief of Environment News Service (ENS), said in an email statement, adding the attack shut down its servers for two hours.
The hacking came after the news service ran a story about
plans to publish Lukas Straumann's (pic) book, "Money Logging: On the
Trail of the Asian Timber Mafia" despite demands by a law firm
representing Tun Abdul Taib Mahmud, a stalwart of the ruling coalition, to
withhold publication.Taib, 78, governor of Sarawak and a powerful member of the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition, has faced mounting accusations of enriching himself and his cronies through a
stranglehold on the state's economy, charges
which he denies.The book "Money Logging" investigates the massive destruction of the Borneo rainforest by Malaysian loggers, described by former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown as "probably the biggest environmental crime of our times".
Malaysian officials were not immediately available for comment.
Sarawak is among Malaysia's poorest states, but Swiss-based
forest protection group Bruno Manser Fund (BMF) says Taib could be worth as
much as US$15 billion (RM50 billion), which would make him one of the world's
richest people.Authorities in Sarawak have previously threatened to jam Radio Free Sarawak broadcasts that focus on alleged graft by the state government.
Source: AFP
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