Malaysian police arrested two Americans for allegedly distributing Christian religious pamphlets to Muslims, police said today.

The two men were detained on Monday and a local court had ordered them to be held for 14 days to assist in investigations, a police spokesman told AFP .

"We want to find out if they had breached any regulations in Malaysia," he said.

It is an offence in mainly-Muslim Malaysia to try to convert Muslims away from their faith.

Another police official named the two men as Ricky Ruperd, in his 30s, and Zachry Harris, in his 20s.

The official Bernama news agency said they were arrested for distributing pamphlets with religious content at Malaysia's new administrative capital Putrajaya.

Putrajaya police chief Mohamad Khalil Kadir Mohamad said the men were detained during routine checks by police and and were found to be without any travel documents.

Visited by embassy staff

A spokesman for the US embassy confirmed the arrests and said Rupert was from Washington state and Harris from Colorado. They had been visited by embassy officials, he said.

Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said earlier this month there was no ban on Bibles published in the Malay language but they must be stamped with the words "Not for Muslims".

He was responding to questions after a minister told parliament the government did not allow editions of the Bible published in Malay to be distributed as it could be construed as an effort to spread Christianity among Muslim-Malays.

Some 60 percent of Malaysia's population are Muslims, while there are large ethnic-Chinese and Indian minorities who practice other religions including Christianity, Buddhism and Hinduism.