The South China Morning Post, HK 10th March 2001

Police have seized computers used to run an opposition Web site suspected of sedition, and a judge rejected a party leader's bid for bail yesterday pending investigations that he threatened to overthrow Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.

The actions reflect a new crackdown on media critical of the Government, led by Asia's longest-serving ruler, and on an opposition that has managed in recent months to step up political demonstrations, some of them in Dr Mahathir's home state.

Police raided the home of Raja Petra Kamaruddin, editor of the opposition National Justice Party's Web site, on Thursday and seized several computers. The editor said that the site would now be operated "offshore".

Police chief Bakri Zinin was quoted by the Sun newspaper as saying that the raid was based on a report by one of his men that an article on the site was seditious.

Because of strict licensing laws which allow the Government to ban opposition publications, Malaysia's four-party opposition coalition relies heavily on the Internet to get its message out.

The Internet has been largely exempt from press restrictions because of promises made by Dr Mahathir to information technology investors that the Government will not try to restrict Malaysian content. "The police have made a mockery of the government policy not to censor the Internet," Mr Kamaruddin said.

In recent weeks, officials have delayed the distribution of some foreign news magazines and harshly criticised an independent news Web site, Malaysiakini.com.

The magazines, Asiaweek and the Far Eastern Economic Review, have carried stories the Government would consider negative, while Malaysiakini is accused of receiving funds from financier George Soros, whom Dr Mahathir blames for causing the 1997 Asian economic crisis. Malaysiakini denies it.

Meanwhile, a judge refused to release Ezam Mohamad Noor, the Justice Party's youth leader, from jail while police investigate him for alleged sedition over comments reported in a newspaper that he vowed to organise demonstrations until the Government was ousted.

Hours after the ruling, about 500 opposition supporters shouted anti-Mahathir slogans outside a mosque. Riot police, backed by water cannon, looked on but did not intervene. "Our enemy is Dr Mahathir," Azmin Ali, a Justice Party official, told the crowd. "We will continue to protest against government abuses."

The crowd shouted Reformasi! - the cry for reform, dating to street demonstrations in 1998 led by Anwar Ibrahim after Dr Mahathir fired him as deputy premier. His wife leads the party.

Street demonstrations dwindled during the two-year process when Anwar was tried and convicted of sodomy and corruption and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

But, due partly to Ezam's organisational capabilities, the opposition has managed to muster several thousand people at protests since November. Ezam, who was arrested on Tuesday, has denied advocating violence.