Malaysia

One of Southeast Asia’s most culturally diverse and tolerant nations, Malaysia has substantial Chinese and Indian minorities living in relative harmony with the ethnic Malay majority. This fragile coalition saw renewed tension in March after prime minister Najib Razak delivered a speech on planned economic reforms that criticized Malaysia’s long-standing New Economic Policy—an affirmative-action program privileging ethnic Malays.

To shelter the country’s Muslim majority, the government regularly censors cinema and television, though it reversed plans to implement a nationwide internet filter in 2009. In May, friction with the state over copyright infringement issues reached a high point when sculptor Datuk Syed Ahmad Jamal Syed Jamil Sahil won a lawsuit against the mayor of Kuala Lumpur for altering his public artwork Puncak Purnama (“Lunar Peaks”) (1985), without the artist’s consent, in 2000. The artist, a National Laureate, was awarded MYR 750,000 (USD 240,000) in damages.

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