Deputy minister forced onto back foot over ISA

comments     Susan Loone     Published     Updated

Deputy Home Minister Zainal Abidin Zin had to mount a quick defence of the continued detention of five reformasi activists under the Internal Security Act (ISA).

While wrapping up the debate on Budget 2003, which has been going on for over two weeks in the Dewan Rakyat, Zainal said the five were being held under the jurisdiction of Home Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, and not that of the police.

On Sept 6, a four-member panel of the Federal Court unanimously allowed the appeals of the reformasi activists Keadilan leaders Tian Chua, Mohd Ezam Mohamed Nor and Saari Sungib, malaysiakini columnist-cum-film maker Hishamuddin Rais and FreeAnwar.com webmaster Raja Petra Kamaruddin to declare their detention as unlawful.

They were arrested in April last year and had subsequently filed a writ of habeas corpus seeking to be released from the ISA, which allows detention without trial.

While the court subjected the police detention power under Section 73 of the ISA to the objective test, it did not question the detention order issued under Section 8. The court therefore only ruled that detention of these activists for the initial 60 days of interrogation was unlawful.

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