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From Times Online

August 25, 2009

Nurse who drank beer given last-minute reprieve

from the cane
Richard Lloyd Parry in Tokyo
As far as Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno was concerned, it was perfectly
straightforward. Two years ago, at a beachside pub in Malaysia, the 32-year old
nurse and part-time model was caught drinking beer, a crime for a Muslim in
Malaysia.

She pleaded guilty and, when the sentence — six strokes of the cane — was
announced, she made no appeal. Ms Kartika, a mother of two, even suggested that
it be carried out in public to discourage others from making the same mistake as she.

But having tried and sentenced her with the full rigour of Islamic shariah law, the authorities in Malaysia have come
over all squeamish about having to carry out their sentence.

Yesterday, Ms Kartika was being driven to prison to receive the blows of the rattan cane, when the van in which she
was being driven unexpectedly turned round and returned her home. The prison where she was to be punished said
that it could not receive her; later, it was announced that her punishment has been postponed, not cancelled, until after
the holy fasting month of Ramadan.

But the last minute change of plan hints at a Malaysian government deeply uneasy about the threat posed to its image
of tolerance and modernity by a punishment regarded in many parts of the world as abhorrent.

Ms Kartika herself expressed indignation at the delay. “I am speechless,” she said afterwards. I want to know what
my status is. I want a black and white statement from them. ... I am shocked but I remain steadfast with my decision.
All I want now is to know my true situation — and do not treat me like a football. I do not know in what situation I’m in.
I’m clueless. I do not know if I am freed, I am in limbo.”

The tourist bars and hotels of Malaysia freely serve alcohol to members of other religions — indeed the country’s
tourist authorities promote sophisticated dining as one of its attractions to western visitors. But for Muslims, who make
up two-thirds of the population, consumption of alcohol is a crime punishable by a fine, by up to three years in prison,
and by six strokes of the cane.

The most usual penalty is a fine of 5000 ringgit (860 pounds), which was also imposed on Ms Kartika. But the
additional penalty of the lashes would be the first ever imposed on a woman by an Islamic court an Islamic court by a
woman, and it has provoked an angry debate about double standards in the application of the law.

Affluent Muslim men are frequently to be seen drinking alcohol in expensive bars in the capital, Kuala Lumpur. The
richest and most powerful Malaysians go to neighbouring Singapore, which has no shariah courts, to drink and
gamble. Ms Kartika was arrested in a raid by religious affairs authorities after three glasses of beer — only the
second time in her life, she said, that she had drunk alcohol.

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