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Malaysian groups say police abuse, corruption continue despite calls for change

© AP
2007-06-15 14:02:59 -

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) - Malaysian human rights groups said Friday that police abuse and corruption in the country have not stopped despite an independent commission's recommendations for sweeping changes.

«Human rights continue to deteriorate,» Yap Swee Seng, executive director of local organization Suaram, said at a meeting of human rights groups. «The culture of impunity is growing. National police chief Inspector General Musa Hassan could not be immediately reached for comment. His mobile phone was switched off.

A royal commission, set up in 2004, made 125 recommendations for changes in the police force to reduce crime, stop corruption and observe human rights.

Last year, Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi announced that 81 recommendations had been implemented, 19 more would be implemented and 25 were still being studied.

But Suaram and Amnesty International Malaysia said few of the recommendations on human rights have been implemented. The implementation of the others has been unsatisfactory, they said. «Unfortunately, until today no details of what has been implemented has been made public,» said Josef Roy Benedict, executive director of Amnesty International Malaysia.

The groups said changes, if any, had been superficial and cosmetic. <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Yap said recommendations pertaining to freedom of assembly had also not been carried out, citing cases of police brutality during peaceful demonstrations as an example. He said people were still detained without trial under the country's Internal Security Act, Dangerous Drugs Act and Emergency Ordinance. Once released, many were re-arrested.

No inquests at all have been made in six of nine cases where people died in police custody last year, Yap said, disregarding the recommendations, which call for an inquest into every case within one month.