Reference is made here to Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail's dismissal of claims by Australian television station, SBS' Dateline programme, that the United States-based International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT) - an organisation, of which her husband, former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim was a director - backed terrorist activities

The first problem for Anwar is that these allegations were not made by his nemesis (Dr Mahathir)'s mainstream news media and lackeys (for which political motives may be conveniently attributed). Instead these allegations were made by Dateline , an Australian television station.

So far a measure of reprieve has come from an unexpected direction a high ranking and high profile member from the ruling party, Minister in PM's Department, Dr Rais Yatim had warned that the report could be a ploy of international parties to tarnish and disparage Malaysia.

If the allegations linking Anwar to IIIT and IIIT to terrorist's financiers were either given credence or proven true by investigations, they would spell the death knell of Anwar's political career, and Keadilan's political prospects and irreversibly cut his patronage link to Washington and its Western allies.

Already there was in place an earlier national policy analysis #344 by Amy Ridenour of the US based National Center for Public Policy Research which warned the US against an over cozy attitude towards political Islamists posing under guise as liberal icons of secular democracy.

She highlighted in the policy analysis "Anwar's political history began as a student activist at the University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur in the late 1960s. Upon graduation in 1971, Anwar played a leading role in founding Angkatan Belia Islam Malaysia, or Abim, the Malaysian fundamentalist youth movement.

By its own description, Abim aimed to generate an Islamic movement as a path to Islamic revival in Malaysia. Anwar traveled to Iran to meet with the Ayatollah Khomeini. He was arrested in 1974 for his role in a student demonstration while his organisation - taking one page each from Marx and the creed of radical Islam - denounced labour exploitation and "all things repugnant to the spirit of Islamic justice."

Keadilan information chief Khalid Jaafar had meanwhile been reported to have said that "IIIT of which Anwar was a director, was a promoter of a moderate interpretation of Islam at all times and that it was "nonsense" to suggest that Anwar had anything to do with terrorism as he had repeatedly condemned terrorism by Muslims in his writings.

Yes Anwar had written an illuminating piece in Time in the aftermath of Sept 11. However, he would need to move from words to deeds. If Keadilan thinks that its patron and de facto head has been libeled or slandered against, either Keadilan or Anwar should institute legal proceedings for defamation against the Australian television station, SBS' Dateline programme instead of being content with a bare denial.

Bare denial itself has not proven to lend much credibility in an innuendo textured milieu of Malaysian politics. There are other reasons why a bare denial would not suffice.

It may not be entirely coincidental that when former Bank Negara assistant governor Abdul Murad Khalid first made public his statutory declaration dated Oct 26, 1999, he alleged that Anwar had amassed a fortune while in government through 20 "master accounts", that he himself Murad was personally involved in the payout of more than RM120 million to Anwar, individuals and organisations between 1992 to 1997, and that such payments included RM2 million to IIIT.

This may be verified by Murad's statutory declaration published on the web and also DAP's Lim Kit Siang media comments on the 2000 budget speech though the veteran also added that "What was most incredible was that Murad had not produced a single shred of evidence to substantiate his very serious allegations".

Many will be entitled to question whether if Anwar did not procure for payments to fund IIIT, on what other basis would IIIT now reciprocate to send RM300,000 to Anwar's eldest daughter Nurul Izzah, which Dr Wan Azizah admitted was given not only to the eldest daughter but "all of Anwar's children"? Perhaps it was because he was one of the four co-founders of IIIT along with late Professor Ismail Faruqi and Sheikh Taha Jabir Al-Ehwani and Dr Abdul Hamid Abu Sulaiman.

Whilst the link between Anwar and terrorism is unproven, the situation is not so clear cut about Anwar's promoting moderate interpretation of Islam as postulated by Keadilan information chief Khalid Jaafar.

Keadilan under steerage of its main patron has always desisted from criticizing PAS' agenda including promulgation of hudud in Terengganu, and in fact, is presently collaborating with PAS to win electoral power in a manner that will surely facilitate PAS' implementation of the Islamic state over the secular federal constitution.

Khalid Jaafar is persuasive that Anwar's IIIT has a moderate interpretation to Islam only if one discounts his earlier reaching out to Ayatollah Khomeini as a role model, and his modus operandi of rallying of crowds up to 50,000 to 100,000 at the mosques to defy the PM's sacking of him from all positions instead of challenging the PM through other means (whether contest via election means or the courts).

Yes, one can believe that Anwar promotes a "moderate interpretation of Islam" if (given the fact that Keadilan is trenchant political ally of PAS) one holds the view that PAS' interpretation of Islam is moderate.