How Courts in Southeast Asia Are Muzzling Free Expression
Amy Sim | Jul 19, 2011
The Jakarta Post
The United Nations special rapporteur for leisure of expression, Frank La Rue, ended his nine-day visit to Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia as good as Thailand this past weekend. In those nine days, the series of events highlighted the dire state of leisure of countenance in Southeast Asia as good as forked toward the series of pass trends as good as new forms of censorship.
The initial instance was upon Jul 9 when Indonesias Supreme Court found Prita Mulyasari, the mom of three, guilty of criminal insult as good as gave her the six-month suspended judgment for sending e-mails to friends complaining about the healing make use of she had perceived during the hospital. This judgment contradicted the previous ruling by the Supreme Court in the polite insult fit in preference of Prita.
Her box obviously exposes the problems with the 2008 Electronic Transactions as good as Information Law, demonstrating how legitimate debate or complaints of make use of can simply be criminalized. Under this law, alleged insult by an individual communicated over the Internet can be punished by up to 6 years in prison as good as the excellent of up to Rp 1 billion ($117,000), some-more than the maximum chastisement for criminal insult underneath the Criminal Code.
Then in Thailand the Royal Thai Air Force commander became the initial troops officer to face trial underneath the lese-majeste law, which protects the sovereign from offensive remarks, as good as the Computer Crime Act for posting messages upon his Facebook page referring to the compulsory father in the TV soap opera as good as song. Following the political disturbance in Thailand, the Internet has turn the battleground for different parties. The supervision has aggressively used the 2007 Computer Crime Act to limit online speech, in all debate by the supporters of the opposition.
The CCA severel! y underm ines the right to openly provide as good as receive report over the Internet by using vague as good as broad! provisi ons subject to interpretation, commanding liability upon Internet make use of providers, carrying out surveillance of users not suspected of the crime as good as restraint Web sites.
In addition, the CCA is mostly used together with lese-majeste charges underneath the Penal Code by the supervision to overpower the critics. Tens of thousands of Web sites have been being blocked, many but any judicial authority. The series of CCA legal cases rose from 28 in 2008 to 76 in 2010.
Internet
Although public access to the Internet is in all promoted in Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia as good as Thailand, governments have been receiving movement as good as putting in place measures to unduly shorten leisure of countenance upon the Internet. Rules upon leisure of countenance have been good established in general human rights law through Article nineteen of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as good as the International Covenant upon Civil as good as Political Rights. Governments must commend which these rules upon leisure of countenance request to Internet communications as well.
Malaysia
Recent events additionally embody the dramatic crackdown upon the Bersih 2.0 campaign in Malaysia. Some 50,000 citizens peacefully took to the streets of Kuala Lumpur upon Jul 9 to call for satisfactory elections, only to face tear gas as good as police beatings. Police arrested as good as then released but charges 1,667 protesters.
Before the rally, the supervision additionally arrested around 40 people underneath the Societies Act for possessing Bersih T-shirts as good as other bootleg materials. They have been faced with the hazard of five years in prison for sportive their right to leisure of expression, assembly as good as association. Furthermore, 6 activists remain detained indefinitely but charge, arrested while traveling to the Bersih 2.0 event upon the guess ! of wagin g war against the king.
Cambodia
In Cambodia upon Thursday, the Supreme Court upheld the two- to three-year prison sentences of 4 men convicted of distributing leaflets allegedly criticizing the governments relationship with Vietnam.! They we re found guilty of incitement underneath the Penal Code.
The courts
A common thread runs through these cases: the frequent make use of of laws to suppress debate as good as opinions. While the region has been undergoing the routine of democratization with the waning of peremptory governments in the final two decades, state actors have found in the justice system an effective apparatus to overpower gainsay as good as to demonize the opposition. By flitting vague as good as overbroad laws, they have been now able to legalize the termination of expression.
With the censors apropos some-more sophisticated in their attempts to shorten leisure of expression, free debate advocates must additionally step up their game to guard both obvious as good as pointed forms of censorship in Southeast Asia as good as reverse the chilling outcome these actions have upon leisure of expression.
Amy Sim is senior module officer during Article 19, the London-based NGO which functions globally to foster as good as protect the right to leisure of expression.
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