Communists played no part in ' May 13 ' riots
After attending the launching forum of May 13 - Declassified Documents on the Malaysian Riots of 1969 (Petaling Jaya, Suaram, 2007) and flipping through the book, I have absolutely no doubt that it is indeed a very important publication for many years to come but editor Dr. Kua Kia Soong has also stated that it is not a definative account of the tragedy yet and other are welcome to contribute to the rational search for truth.pp. 43-45 of the book also published for the first time previously classified records of even British intelligence disbelieving Tunku's blame on the "communists" for the riots which were, in the assessment of Kua, " a coup d’etat against the Tunku by the then emergent Malay state capitalists - backed by the police and army to seize control of the reign of power from the old aristocrats ... ".
Sociologist Kua has also pointed out that the 'May 13' riots were " by no means a spontaneous outburst of racial violence as it has been portrayed to the Malaysian public " for the last 38 years.
Responding a point put forward by this blogger, a retired Special Branch chief and former Sarawak and Perak CPO Yuen Yuet Leng (袁悦凌) who also attended the launching forum, publicly conceded that "communists would never start racial riots".
A middle-aged Kelantanese Chinese Mr. Ong testified that Chinese felt safe in PAS strongholds at that time while another speaker Dr. Syed Husin Ali, who is now the deputy president of Parti KeADILan Rakyat (PKR), observed that there were also no riots in other Malay-majority states like Perlis, Kedah, Trengganu and Pahang.
According to the chair of the forum Elizabeth Wong, May 13 - Declassified Documents on the Malaysian Racial Riot of 1969 will be translated into Malay, Chinese and Tamil for popular distribution.
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posted by James Wong Wing-On at 5:43 PM
2 Comments:
those with bloods in their hands, i just cant imagine that they can sleep soundly in their last leg of life. prayers would not help except to confess publicly and let it out from the heart. only then, would you rest in peace. that would be the least for those that were wronged.
Hi James,
I always thought the official version of May 13 was "fishy". A lot of things didn't add up once you read it in detail and linked it to the historical context and various eyewitness accounts.
In the end it sounds like a cooked-up story.
Still, I would urge readers to exercise their critical thinking in reading the latest book. The declassified British reports would have come from their intelligence and diplomatic sources. Much of it would be raw intelligence which nobody has looked at for nearly 40 years. Intelligence reports are not always accurate.
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