Anwar willing to join Suhakam’s visits to police lockups

 

A 1998 photo of Anwar Ibrahim sporting a black eye after he was assaulted in a police lockup became a symbol of the Reformasi movement. (File pic)

PETALING JAYA: 

Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has expressed willingness to join Suhakam in the human rights commission’s visits to police lockups as part of an investigation into custodial deaths.

Anwar recalled his own experience of being beaten while in police custody in 1998 and said the issue of deaths or injuries of detainees in lockups must be urgently resolved, Bernama reported.

When people raise concerns regarding abuse and deaths in lockups, there’s no need to convince me because I know how it feels. It feels helpless when you’re assaulted to near death while in lockup,

 he said.

“We need to support all efforts to protect the suspect or convict in the lockup, and I’m pleased to say that both the home minister and inspector-general of police support the idea. 

(But) our concern is that police abuse is not necessarily to blame for everyone who comes out with cuts, injuries or even dies in custody,

 he was quoted as saying.

Anwar was assaulted in the Bukit Aman lockup in 1998 by then inspector-general of police Abdul Rahim Noor soon after the former was fired from the government by then prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

Anwar appeared at the Kuala Lumpur court with a black eye. A photograph of Anwar, with the bruised eye and raising his hand in defiance, became an iconic image of the opposition Reformasi movement that rallied for him to be freed.

Rahim was later sentenced to two months’ jail and fined RM2,000 for the assault on Anwar.

Anwar said Suhakam and the police will probe and study the issue of custodial deaths so that appropriate procedures and protections may be established to prevent them.

He added that Inspector-General of Police Razarudin Husain has expressed the willingness of the police force to cooperate with Suhakam.

The police investigate, the judges deliver the sentence. Before a sentence is passed, suspects should not be punished,

 he said. - FMT