Malaysia's PAS urges allies to back off from hudud and fight common enemy

PETALING JAYA (THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK) - Fight the common enemy and back off from hudud, the Islamic penal code, Parti Islam seMalaysia (PAS) told its allies amidst a police crackdown on their leaders.

PAS vice-president Datuk Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man said Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) and Democratic Action Party (DAP) should stop picking on PAS' Kelantan hudud plans and focus on their common enemy.

"Pakatan Rakyat should focus on Barisan Nasional's discrepancies and abuse of power and not concentrate on our differences, especially hudud," he said Saturday.

He brushed the hudud aside as a "small" issue, adding that the push to legalise it would only give the Syariah Court a bit more power to carry out punishments.

"Respect our small differences in order for us to celebrate our immensely broad similarities. Our common enemy is still the same, which is BN-Umno," he said.

He said the arrests of PAS deputy president Mohamad Sabu, PKR vice-presidents Tian Chua, Rafizi Ramli and other activists would only paint a negative picture of the government.

"Such action would only add people's hatred towards the Barisan government as they would also lose respect to the police," he said. "This shows that Malaysia needs a strong Opposition to ensure that Barisan behaves themselves."

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