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| | Malaysia's Internal Security Act and Suppression of Political Dissentr (Human Rights Watch Backgrounder, May 2002) |
 | | Malaysia's Internal Security Act (ISA) is a preventive detention law originally enacted in the early 1960s during a national state of emergency as a temporary measure to fight a communist rebellion. |
 | | The ISA was used to arrest political opponents of Mahathir in a major crackdown in 1987-88, as well as politicians in Sabah, east Malaysia, in 1990, whose party was considered a major rival to the ruling party, UMNO. |
 | | Former ISA detainees have testified to being subjected to severe physical and psychological torture, including allegations of physical assault, forced nudity, sleep deprivation, around-the-clock interrogation, death threats, threats of bodily harm to family members, including threats of rape and bodily harm to their children. |
| www.hrw.org /backgrounder/asia/malaysia-bck-0513.htm (2050 words) |
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