Is it acceptable to cane women?
Since that information can easily be compiled with a few phone calls, and the subject of the conference as proposed does not, at first glance, hold much promise of enlightened or even interesting discussion, you have to wonder: what’s going on here?
Al Jazeera
Malaysia wants to organise an international conference to “discuss” the caning of women.
It will be international only in a limited sense, since only other Muslim nations will be invited, and the agenda is extremely vague. Minister Shahrizat Abdul Jalil says only
‘The ministry hopes … we can make a comparative study on whether the sentence is normally practised among Muslim countries.
Since that information can easily be compiled with a few phone calls, and the subject of the conference as proposed does not, at first glance, hold much promise of enlightened or even interesting discussion, you have to wonder: what’s going on here?
Well, in true Malaysian style, it’s looking increasingly like a hasty and ham-fisted effort to manage the fallout – and gain political leverage – from the news that this month, for the first time in Malaysian history, three women were subjected to caning by authorities.
The women (along with four men, but there was no information provided about the apparent mismatch in numbers) were accused of having sex outside of wedlock, and sentenced by Malaysia’s autonomous sharia court.
