Malaysia

by Joseph Masilamany | MALAYSIA

In its latest annual report, Amnesty International calls for full abolition of the death penalty. With the 2018 moratorium Malaysia has made progress, but that's not enough. Between July 2023 and January 2024, the death penalty was pronounced 26 times. For lawyer Michael Kong, “open public discussions about justice” are needed.


Today's news: reports of workplace abuse have doubled in South Korea in five years; Baghdad will send 10 million liters of fuel to the Gaza Strip; Public apology from a company in Malaysia for a shoe logo that resembles the word "Allah"; The Taliban have built a wall around the Eidgah mosque in Kandahar for fear of ISIS attacks: Moscow has slowed issuing work permits to migrants from Central Asia.

| 08/04/2024
| ASIA TODAY

Today's news: Pakistani court suspends sentence against former premier Imran Khan; Southeast Asians would rather side with China than the US; Pyongyang launches another missile towards the coast; King of Malaysia signals the end of 'honeymoon' for head of Anti-Corruption Commission; In Kazakhstan this year's floods were the most disastrous in three decades.

| 02/04/2024
| ASIA TODAY

After waiting in vain for asylum in Malaysia where she converted to Christianity, Laleh Saati, 45, returned to Iran. A local court found her guilty of acting "against national security” based on alleged links to " Zionist Christian organisations". The video of her baptism was entered as “evidence” of her “crime”.

| 30/03/2024
| IRAN – MALAYSIA

A group of 17 Christians took part in the gesture promoted by the diocesan office for human development. In Chow Kit they lived together with street people, sleeping next to them on cardboard boxes. "We experienced their love for their neighbour," one of the participants tells Herald Malaysia. The contact with poverty in one of the largest eononomies in South East Asia.

| 25/03/2024
| MALAYSIA
by Joseph Masilamany

The decision by the KK Supermart chain to sell the offensive time has become a national cause célèbre. Wading into the controversy, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim calls for accountability without going “overboard”. For Michael Kong, a non-Muslim politician from Sarawak, in multiethnic Malaysia, “it is important for us to show understanding towards other races and beliefs.”

 

| 22/03/2024
| MALAYSIA
by Joseph Masilamany

A gesture by a car dealership saleswoman mirrors a society divided between tolerance and fundamentalism. Internet users divided between those who appreciate the acceptance of the Hindu blessing and those who attack her for committing a grave sin for a Muslim. The case of the team consisting of a Hindu surgeon, a Buddhist anaesthetist and Muslim nurses who operated on a Catholic priest. 

| 20/03/2024
| MALAYSIA
Editor's choices
 
While the country is getting ready to welcome Pope Francis in September, amendments have been proposed to assert the country’s Christian identity. For the Catholic Bishops' Conference, this is a “dangerous” step that “obscures ...
| 24/04/2024
| PAPUA NEW GUINEA
 
Not only Gaza and the war in Ukraine: the global arms race is also driven by Chinese pressure on Taiwan.. The 6.8% growth represents "the highest year-on-year growth since 2009". China, Russia, India and Saudi Arabia among the world's top five with ...
| 22/04/2024
| ASIA - MIDDLE EAST
 
by Dario Salvi
Layan Nasir, a 23-year-old native of Birzeit, is the only Christian woman under "administrative detention". She was taken, blindfolded and handcuffed, overnight by a military patrol without an arrest warrant or charges against her. The Bethlehem ...
| 19/04/2024
| ISRAEL – PALESTINE
 
Chinese Human Rights Defenders released a report detailing the stories of children and young people victims of human rights violations, like He Fengmei's daughter, who was separated from her mother a month after her birth and kept in a psychiatric ...
| 16/04/2024
| CHINA
 
Currently in intensive care, the seven-year-old is the only person to be seriously wounded by Iran’s attack against Israel because her house and village were not covered by Israel’s Iron Dome defence system. Nothing is known of the fate of ...
| 15/04/2024
| ISRAEL – GAZA - IRAN
 
by Daniele Frison
The auxiliary bishop of Jerusalem and patriarchal vicar for Palestine looks at the protests in Amman. Diplomatic relations with Israel allow aid to be sent to Gaza. Some students from Gaza’s Holy Family Parish arrived in Amman thanks to the Patriarchate’s ...
| 12/04/2024
| JORDAN
 
The Holy See has officially announced the long journey to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste, and Singapore. Card Goh of Singapore hopes the pope will bring to his predominantly Chinese city, “renewed fervour to all Catholics [. . .], especially ...
| 12/04/2024
| VATICAN
 
by card. Anthony Poola *
The Archbishop of Hyderabad looks at the media reaction to the declaration released by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith on human dignity. The media are “focused on gender theory, sex change, surrogacy etc., but” people who “struggle ...
| 11/04/2024
| INDIA
“L’Asia: ecco il nostro comune compito per il terzo millennio!” - Giovanni Paolo II, da “Alzatevi, andiamo”