GOVT WON'T INTERCEDE FOR DRUG MULES HELD ABROAD

KUCHING: Do not expect the government to interfere -- this is the
reminder from Deputy Foreign Minister Datuk Joseph Salang to women
arrested overseas for drug-related offences. "At best, we will send a
lawyer or representative from our foreign mission to see that the
trial is fair.

"Other than that, we will not interfere. The reason is that Malaysia
has stiffer penalties for drug-related offences," he said when asked
to comment on the case of 22-year-old Irene Manggie of Sarawak, who
was arrested and charged in Sao Paulo for possession of cocaine.

She has been in prison for the last five months pending trial.

Salang said Malaysian women should know better than carry bags to
foreign countries given by people they had just befriended.

"All they need to do is to open the bags to check the contents. If
the contents are drugs, they should refuse to carry them."

However, he said in most cases, the women knew what they were doing.

He said they were prepared to carry the drugs because of the huge
financial rewards.

He said some of them did not even inform the Malaysian embassy when
they were arrested.

Salang said two other women from Sarawak had also been arrested -- in
Argentina (where the case is pending) and in Japan (where the appeal
is pending).