December 12, 2010
Singapore leaders believe Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim had sex with a male aide in a honey trap set by his enemies, according to leaked US cables published by WikiLeaks on Sunday.
A US state department cable dated November 2008 and given by the whistleblower to Australia’s Fairfax media group detailed intelligence gathered by Australian and Singaporean intelligence on the opposition leader’s case.
“The Australians said that Singapore’s intelligence services and (former prime minister) Lee Kuan Yew have told ONA (Office of National Assessments) in their exchanges that opposition leader Anwar ‘did indeed commit the acts for which he is currently indicted’,” the cable read.
It added that Singapore reached its conclusion based on “technical intelligence,” which a Fairfax report said was likely to involve intercepted communications.
“ONA assessed, and their Singapore counterparts concurred, ‘it was a set-up job and he probably knew that, but walked into it anyway’,” the cable wrote.
Anwar, 63, has vehemently denied sodomizing his aide, 25-year-old Mohamad Saiful Bukhari Azlan, claiming he was the victim of a political conspiracy.
He faces 20 years in prison if found guilty of sodomy, a serious crime in Muslim-dominated Malaysia.
Tian Chua, vice-president of Anwar’s People’s Justice Party, dismissed the revelations as “hearsay.”
“There is no doubt that this is a trumped-up charge,” he said. “If the claim is true ... it would have been relatively easy for the government to prove it.”
“We cannot depend on what the foreign intelligence officials say. The question is whether the government has evidence to convict Anwar in court.”
Human Rights Watch has urged Malaysia to drop the charges against Anwar, condemning the case as a “charade of justice”.
Anwar, a former deputy premier, was sacked in 1998 and jailed on separate sodomy and corruption counts.
His sodomy conviction was later overturned and he was freed after serving six years in jail, enabling him to mount a political comeback as head of the opposition.
Agence France-Presse
A US state department cable dated November 2008 and given by the whistleblower to Australia’s Fairfax media group detailed intelligence gathered by Australian and Singaporean intelligence on the opposition leader’s case.
“The Australians said that Singapore’s intelligence services and (former prime minister) Lee Kuan Yew have told ONA (Office of National Assessments) in their exchanges that opposition leader Anwar ‘did indeed commit the acts for which he is currently indicted’,” the cable read.
It added that Singapore reached its conclusion based on “technical intelligence,” which a Fairfax report said was likely to involve intercepted communications.
“ONA assessed, and their Singapore counterparts concurred, ‘it was a set-up job and he probably knew that, but walked into it anyway’,” the cable wrote.
Anwar, 63, has vehemently denied sodomizing his aide, 25-year-old Mohamad Saiful Bukhari Azlan, claiming he was the victim of a political conspiracy.
He faces 20 years in prison if found guilty of sodomy, a serious crime in Muslim-dominated Malaysia.
Tian Chua, vice-president of Anwar’s People’s Justice Party, dismissed the revelations as “hearsay.”
“There is no doubt that this is a trumped-up charge,” he said. “If the claim is true ... it would have been relatively easy for the government to prove it.”
“We cannot depend on what the foreign intelligence officials say. The question is whether the government has evidence to convict Anwar in court.”
Human Rights Watch has urged Malaysia to drop the charges against Anwar, condemning the case as a “charade of justice”.
Anwar, a former deputy premier, was sacked in 1998 and jailed on separate sodomy and corruption counts.
His sodomy conviction was later overturned and he was freed after serving six years in jail, enabling him to mount a political comeback as head of the opposition.
Agence France-Presse
No comments:
Post a Comment