KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 21 — The Magistrate’s Court has allowed a human rights activist to challenge the constitutionality of a Film Censorship Act 2002 provision over the screening of a documentary on Sri Lanka’s civil war allegedly without government approval.
Pusat Komas programme coordinator Lena Hendry cleared the first hurdle to take her challenge of Section 6 of the Film Censorship Act to the High Court over the right to freedom of speech and expression that is enshrined under Article 10 of the Federal Constitution.
“The magistrate allowed Lena Hendry’s application to refer certain questions in relation to the constitutionality of Section 6 of the Film Censorship Act 2002 to the High Court,” Lena’s lawyer New Sin Yew told Malay Mail Online today.
Lena was charged in September last year under the Film Censorship Act with screening the documentary “No Fire Zone: The Killing Fields of Sri Lanka” on July 3, 2013, at the Kuala Lumpur Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall here without approval from the Film Censorship Board.
Section 6 of the Film Censorship Act prohibits an individual from exhibiting a film that has not been approved by the Board and imposes a punishment of a fine up to RM30,000, or imprisonment of not more than three years, or both.
International human rights group Human Rights Watch said in October last year that the charges against Lena appeared to be politically motivated.
According to the group, the Sri Lanka embassy had urged Malaysia’s Foreign Ministry and the Film Censorship Board to stop the screening of the award-winning documentary on alleged war crimes by the Sri Lankan government during the end of the Sri Lankan civil war in 2009.
“The documentary shows government artillery attacks that killed children, women, and the elderly and extrajudicial executions of captured fighters and civilians by government forces,” said Human Rights Watch.
