Ethics Newsline®

KUALA LUMPUR
The Canadian government last week condemned Malaysia’s recent imprisonment of a Canadian journalist who wrote a critical article about the Malaysian judiciary as an unwarranted attack on freedom of expression.

Murray Hiebert, the local bureau chief for the Far Eastern Economic Review, owned by Dow Jones & Co., last week began serving a six-week sentence on contempt-of-court charges related to a January 1997 story that Hiebert wrote about the litigious nature of Malaysia, focusing on the wife of a Malaysian judge who sued a school because her son was dropped from the school’s debating team.

Canadian foreign minister Lloyd Axworthy has threatened to request a review of Malaysia’s actions at an upcoming human-rights meeting this month in New York, the Reuters news agency reported.

The Malaysian government’s action has also been criticized by the United States and an alliance of 30 Malaysian nongovernmental organizations.