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Malaysia: Popular English daily "New Straits Times" has withdrawn the columns of social activist Zainah Anwar

Submitted by wluml on Wed, 08/22/2007 - 23:00
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Reporters Without Borders / Sisters in Islam
Women's rights activist Zainah Anwar and writer-filmmaker Amir Muhammad have been suddenly cancelled.
Reporters Without Borders is worried about the English-language New Straits Times newspaper’s decision to fire two of its best-known columnists, Muslim women’s rights activist Zainah Anwar and writer and filmmaker Amir Muhammad. In her last column, on 27 July, Anwar urged the government to respect press freedom so that mainstream journalism "remains a credible source of information in the face of challenges from new media."
Muhammad, who defied the censors by publishing the full version of his columns on his blog (amirmu.blogspot.com), had been writing for the newspaper since last year. His last column appeared on 2 August. In response to a query from the Centre for Independent Journalism, a Malaysian NGO, a New Straits Times spokesperson said the two columnists were dropped because of a lack of space.

Source: Reporters Without Borders

21 August 2007

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Zainah Anwar is the Executive Director of Sisters in Islam (SIS), a non-governmental organisation working on the rights of Muslim women within the framework of Islam. She is also a former member of the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia.

Zainah Anwar is key to the high public profile of Sisters in Islam. She has been the public face of SIS and gives public talks on Islam and women's rights, politics and fundamental liberties, nationally and internationally.

Her other work experience includes: Chief Programme Officer, Political Affairs Division, Commonwealth Secretariat, London; Freelance Writer; Senior Analyst, Institute of Strategic and International Studies, Kuala Lumpur; and Political and Diplomatic Writer, New Straits Times, Kuala Lumpur. Her book, Islamic Revivalism in Malaysia: Dakwah Among the Students, has become a standard reference in the study of Islam in Malaysia.

Zainah was educated at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University, Boston University and the MARA Institute of Technology, Malaysia, in the fields of international relations and journalism.