KUALA LUMPUR - One of Malaysia's best-known political
cartoonists has been arrested for sedition over a Twitter posting that criticized the jailing of opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, the artist's wife
said Wednesday.
Zulkifli Anwar Ulhaque - better known as Zunar - was
arrested Tuesday night, hours after Anwar was jailed for five years in a politically
charged sodomy case.
"Of course this is a form of intimidation, with the
purpose that society does not question the authorities," his wife Fazlina
Rosley told AFP.
"Zunar will not bow down to this intimidation. He will
continue to criticise even if he remains in jail." The cartoonist's lawyer
Melissa Sasidaran said he is expected to be held for a few days.
Zunar, 52, had suggested in a Twitter post that Malaysia's
judiciary - whose independence has been questioned before in 
political cases -
had bowed to the country's authoritarian regime.
political cases -
had bowed to the country's authoritarian regime.
"Those in the black robes were proud when passing
sentence. The rewards from their political masters must be lucrative," the
tweet had said.
Prime Minister Najib Razak's government has been condemned
at home and abroad for filing a wave of sedition cases against its opponents
over the past year, apparently in response to the opposition's growing
electoral successes.
- Tuesday's Anwar ruling was also criticised by international human rights groups and the United States, which said it raised questions over the rule of law.
- Anwar called the ruling a "political conspiracy" to run him out of politics.
- Zunar has courted the attention of authorities in the past through his cartoons, which often take aim at Najib, his notoriously spendthrift wife Rosmah Mansor, and contentious issues such as Anwar's sodomy trial.
- Earlier this month, he said his office was raided by police as part of an apparently separate sedition investigation.
The country's hardline police chief Khalid Abu Bakar said on
Twitter Tuesday that authorities also would investigate two opposition
politicians for sedition over tweets critical of the Anwar ruling.
Human Rights Watch, in a statement criticising Zunar's
arrest, said Najib's government was "turning peaceful criticism into a
criminal act that threatens the state."
Source: AFP
Post a Comment