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Wednesday June 27, 2012

Borders wants clear guidelines on banned books


PETALING JAYA: Borders wants a standard process through which decisions to ban books are communicated clearly, consistently and in a timely manner by the Home Ministry and the Federal Territory Islamic Religious Department (Jawi).

“The issue here is not about Borders wanting to challenge the order to ban the book made on May 29.

“The fundamental issue here is about Jawi’s action against a Borders employee to the extent of charging her in court even before a ban had been officially gazetted and announced,” said Berjaya Books Sdn Bhd COO Yau Su Peng in a statement.

The Kuala Lumpur High Court had on Sunday granted Borders leave for a judicial review proceedings against Jawi’s raid, search and seizure of Irshad Manji’s controversial books at a Borders bookstore on May 23.

“We had no choice but to make the application for leave to the High Court on June 18 in order to protect our employees from prosecution,” said Yau.

High Court judge Justice Datuk Rohana Yusuf who granted the leave order also directed Borders to file an inter-parte application to stay all of Jawi’s actions and proceedings.

“We will file it within the week,” Yau added.

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