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Saturday, 13 January 2001 01:06 PM
On 27th October 2000, Mr. SMITH of New Jersey (for himself, Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN,
Mr. LANTOS, Mr. ROHRABACHER, Mr. ROYCE, Mr. ABERCROMBIE, and Mr. WEXLER)
submitted a resolution (details of the Resolution can be read here) which was
referred to the Committee on International Relations.
The Resolution called, "Expressing the Sense of the House of Representatives with respect to Dato Seri Anwar Ibrahim", was submitted to the House of Representatives.
On 18th December 2000, the Malaysian Government, yet again, came out with a false news report that "seven members of the United States Congress have expressed satisfaction with Malaysia's explanation of the case involving former Deputy Prime Minister Dato Seri Anwar Ibrahim."
The full report is as follows:
Seven members of the United States Congress have expressed satisfaction with Malaysia's explanation of the case involving former Deputy Prime Minister Dato Seri Anwar Ibrahim, the Senate (Malaysia's Upper House) was told Monday.
"The seven Congressmen who had tabled a resolution over the Anwar case were briefed on the actual situation by Malaysia's Ambassador to the United States and they went away satisfied," Deputy Foreign Minister Datuk Leo Michael Toyad told the House during Question Time.
Replying to Senator N. Marimuthu, he said, "the resolution nevertheless had no consequence on the Malaysian Government."
"The congressmen were misled by opposition party leaders who tried to discredit the government overseas," Dr Michael Toyad said.
The International Free Anwar Campaign would like to state that the Malaysian Government's announcement is a blatant lie and just confirms that the government has embarked on a campaign of lies.
Previously the government underreported the number of people who attended the 5 November 2000 "Gathering of 100,000 People", which was much higher than the figure reported by the Government. Then, in late November 2000, the government announced that Dr Mahathir had met Yusuf al-Qardhawi in Qatar when in fact he had not.
And now this report on the seven US Congressmen!
First of all, the Malaysian Ambassador has not yet met all the seven US Congressmen as claimed. Secondly, they could not have "gone away satisfied" when it was the Malaysian Ambassador who would go to meet them and not the other way around. It would be the Malaysian Ambassador, therefore, who would have "gone away" after the meeting with the Congressmen.
Finally, the seven Congressmen are far from satisfied as what the Malaysian Government has reported.
Soon after the introduction of the "Sense of the House Resolution" the Malaysian Ambassador requested a meeting with the Congressmen to try to convince them to take their names off the Resolution.
Today, FAC News received a letter from Congressman Christopher H. Smith, Chairman of the Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights, which rebuts what the Malaysian government has said. (Full text of the letter can be read here).
That is the real situation with regards to the Resolution submitted by the seven US Congressmen and not as what was reported by the Malaysian Government on 18th December 2000.
The International Free Anwar Campaign also has information
that the Malaysian Government is attempting to employ a Washington based
public-media relations firm to lobby the US Congress on its behalf - the same
"crime" that the Malaysian Government has accused Anwar Ibrahim's
supporters of committing.
Raja Petra Kamarudin