CNET: Blogger jailing backfires on Malaysian government | Politics and Law. If the Malaysian government had hoped that the recent detention of controversial blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin would quell the country’s vociferous blogger community, it may need to look elsewhere.
on Oct 1st, 2008 at 10:15 pm
Interesting, thanks for pointing it out, but remember Andy Dufresne’s first words in Shawshank: “What was his name?”
The story is under Declan’s banner, but Declan didn’t file it. It’s by a Malaysian freelance reporter, Lee Min Keong, who often writes about the Malaysian blogs.
The name of the detained blogger is Raja Petra Kamarudin, apparently known as “RPK” in Malaysia.
It’s an even more interesting back story, though it’s clear RPK is not some random blogger. He’s a well-read opposition party pundit who appears to have some key sources who were witnesses to a crime and to manufactured investigation. There is cause for concern, but this is not a garden-variety insult-Islam-go-to-jail. This does not appear to be a general quelling of the blogosphere; they’re merely putting the screws on RPK to reveal his anonymous sources. It’s happened here. (Though it would be the equivalent of Michael Moore getting jailed here, I suppose.)
Of course, I have full sympathies to RPK. I just don’t know if it’s clear that Malaysia is taking a beating especially because of this.
on Nov 10th, 2008 at 10:34 pm
To update this story, Raja Petra was freed.
The Malaysian papers don’t go into details, but I’m still of the impression this was less a result of a blanket free-speech crackdown than it was an attempt to squeeze him to reveal his sources.