When Jane's Intelligence Review and Singapore's Straits Times wrongly accused PAS of having links with the al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, PAS immediately demanded an apology. The two publications then offered their retraction of the unfounded allegation and apologised openly. PAS has also accepted it with magnanimity.

Similarly, Dr Mahathir Mohamad should immediately demand the American magazine Newsweek to apologise if he is certain that Malaysia was not used by terrorists as a launching pad to conduct the Sept 11 attacks in Washington DC and New York City ( 'No M'sian connection' to US terror attacks: Mahathir

, Jan 28). There is no point in just denying it and doing nothing. Mahathir and the government should learn from PAS.

If Mahathir sues Newsweek for slander and defamation on behalf of the people and government of Malaysia, I am sure all Malaysians will support him. However, if he does not, then we can hardly be faulted for thinking PAS is more credible than Mahathir.

Another way to deal with Newsweek is for Home Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to ban its circulation altogether under the Internal Security Act or Printing Presses and Publications Act. In short, only action will prove who is right.