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Malaysia high court acquits migrant rights activist

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

[JURIST] A Malaysian labor activist jailed for alleging police brutality against illegal immigrants in detention was acquitted by the Kuala Lumpur High Court on Monday. Irene Fernandez, the director and cofounder of migrant workers' rights group Tenaganita, was arrested in 1996. In 2003 she was convicted on a charge of violating Section 8A (1) of the Printing Presses and Publications Act and sentenced to a year in prison as a result of her 1995 report exposing the living conditions of migrant workers in Malaysian detention centers, alleging sexual abuse and denial of adequate medical care. Judge Datuk Mohamad Apandi Ali set aside the conviction and sentence of the magistrate court because prosecutor Shamsul Sulaiman refused to oppose the appeal on the grounds that he had discovered "systematic errors in the records" which would make opposing the appeal contrary to justice. AP has more. Fernandez received the 2005 Right Livelihood Award for her work for the rights of Malaysia's poorest groups, even through her trial and appeal. Malaysia has been engaged in an ongoing effort to limit illegal immigration and its dependency on foreign workers. It was named as one of the worst refugee rights violators in a 2008 report by the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (UCSRI).

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on November 24, 2008 (boomark / email).