KUCHING, Oct 30: PRS president Tan Sri Dr James Jemut Masing has criticised former premier Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad for his comments “to kill millions of French people” shortly after a knife-wielding Tunisian man killed three people in a deadly terror attack in a church in Nice, France.
Masing reiterated that the laws of civilised nations are that no one is allowed to take laws into their own hands, let alone taking somebody else’s lives just because that person happens to disagree with his or her beliefs or stance on certain issues.
“That’s why we have laws and court system to ensure that we don’t revert back to the laws of the jungle. Mahathir’s comments on the killing of non-Muslims in French is the reflection of who he is as a person. It’s not Malaysian’s (opinion). We live and abide by rule of laws,” Masing said in a statement issued here today.
Masing, who is also Deputy Chief Minister was commenting on Dr Mahathir’s statement in Twitter that Muslims have the right “to kill millions of French people”, shortly after a knife-wielding Tunisian man killed three people in a deadly terror attack in Nice, France.
Dr Mahathir who lost power in February this year, said freedom of expression does not include ‘insulting other people’ as fury over satirical cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed sweeps the Islamic world.
The 95-year-old politician said he did not approve of the beheading of a French school teacher for sharing caricatures of the Prophet, but said: “Irrespective of the religion professed, angry people kill”.
“The French in the course of their history [have] killed millions of people. Many were Muslims,’ he said in a tweet which has since been removed for violating the website’s rules.
Dr Mahathir, who has drawn controversy for comments about Jews and LGBT people in the past, went saying that Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past” although he did not elaborated.
The Malaysian politician said that “by and large”, Muslims have not applied the principle of “eye for an eye”: “Muslims don’t. The French shouldn’t. Instead the French should teach their people to respect other people’s feelings”.
Dr Mahathir, who served as Malaysian premier twice for a total of 24 years, also accused French President Emmanuel Macron as “very primitive” and “not showing that he is civilised”.
However, former Prime Minister made no direct reference to the attack in a church in Nice, but his comments come amid fury across the Islamic world at Macron for defending caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed, and on the day that Sunni Muslims mark Prophet Muhammad’s birthday yesterday. — DayakDaily
