郭仁德‧ 他們不是恐怖份子！

“我們到這裡來，目的是尋求公正，討回馬來西亞人做人的尊嚴。”

“真正的公正是依靠事實來分清是非。我方經過深入調查，認清事實，已掌握證據，可分清是非。60年前，英治時期宣佈馬來亞實施緊急狀態，英軍在 1948年12月峇冬加里射殺24名烏魯音村民，指責他們是恐怖份子、匪徒。我方擁有足夠證據，證明這些村民被錯誤射殺，他們不是恐怖份子，他們不是匪徒。”

“我方希望英政府有道德勇氣重新糾正這宗錯誤慘案，消除殉難家屬最愛的親人被標簽為恐怖份子與匪徒的恥辱，並與我方同共探討道歉賠償的方式。”

這是馬來西亞巫籍律師弗魯斯．胡申今年7月3日於英國倫敦國防部大樓會議室的發言（部份）。

他是“追討英軍屠殺罪行工委會”的義務律師之一。工委會在6月18日接到英政府來信，邀請派代表會談，尋求解決糾紛方案。

英政府代表團由國防部與外交部高級官員組成，以國防部仲裁庭與調查組主任佐納丹．杜克艾溫為首，成員包括國際部與外交部律師，合共5人。

Britain Reconsiders Inquiry Into Batang Kali Massacre

By Neville Spykerman

KUALA LUMPUR, July 12 — A painful but necessary final chapter surrounding the deaths of 24 rubber tappers who died at the hands of the British Army in 1948 may soon be unveiled.

The British government, whose representatives met lawyers representing families of victims in London on July 3, are considering holding an inquiry more than 60 years after the Batang Kali massacre occurred.

Lawyers Datuk Dominic Puthucheary, Firoz Hussein and Quek Ngee Meng who met officials from Britain’s Ministry of Defense (MOD) and Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said a decision would be made on August 14.

During the meeting Puthucheary said he urged the British government to have the “moral courage” to hold the inquiry.

Will the release of secret documents allow the real story of the Batang Kali massacre to be told?

Source: The Independent, July 11 2009

Malaya, 1948. In one of the most controversial incidents in British military history, 24 unarmed civilians were killed by a platoon of Scots Guards. Now the release of secret documents means the real story may be told at last

In her recurring nightmare Tham Yong’s fiancé is calling her from the spirit world to go back to the river to look for survivors. She can see the pained expression on his face and his outstretched arms beckoning her to return to the scene of a massacre that wiped out every adult male in their village.

The images which still haunt the 78-year-old grandmother are as vivid now as they were when Britain’s colonial war in Malaya first broke upon this small settlement of Chinese rubber-tree tappers, 45 miles north-west of the capital, Kuala Lumpur. “I have other bad dreams too,” says Tham Yong. “I dream that the British want to kill me. I tell them that we are good people, we are all innocent, but the soldiers just keep repeating that we must be bad people and we must die.”

Just three years after the end of the Second World War, Commonwealth forces were again heavily engaged in a bitter jungle war – this time against a small army of Chinese communists whose attacks on Britain’s industry and rubber-tree plantations threatened to overthrow colonial rule.

Sixty-one years later, Tham Yong says she cannot forget the night a patrol of 16 Scots Guards crept into her village in search of an elusive enemy whose hit-and-run tactics had won them early successes over the much larger British forces. Acting on military and local intelligence, the patrol had been briefed that settlements around Batang Kali were being used as a “bandit” supply centre. When the soldiers left the village on the afternoon of 12 December 1948, 24 Chinese civilians, including Tham Yong’s fiancé, were dead. All were unarmed and all had been shot while trying to escape. There were no wounded and it was thought that there had been no survivors.

Britain to state stand on Batang Kali

KUALA LUMPUR: The British government will announce on Aug 14 its position on the outstanding issue of the Batang Kali massacre.

For the past 60 years, the British government has rejected demands for investigations into the killings, most recently on Jan 21 this year, without giving full reasons.

Then on April 27, it withdrew the rejection.

工委會：會談取共識‧英允設委會調查

(吉隆坡）“追討英軍屠殺罪行工委會”義務律師團召集人郭義民指出，該工委會3名律師已於7月3日前往英國會見英國政府的代表後，英國政府將設立公共調查委員會，以針對有關英軍屠殺罪行進行調查。

他今日（週日，7月12日）聯同工委會執行顧問陳凱希、主席郭仁德、秘書符昌和，以及義務律師拿督多米尼與弗魯斯胡申等人，在記者會匯報進展；工委會要求英政府賠償8000萬英鎊（約馬幣4億6500萬令吉），作為24個死者的家屬的賠償金、烏魯音華社的福利與文教用途，並要求道歉和為死者建立紀念碑。

8月14日前回覆

郭義民表示，英國政府官員將與聯同該工委會的2名英國人權律師，即哈爾佛和克魯斯談商，以取得共識和解決該工委會追討英軍屠殺罪行的問題，並將會在8月14日之前給予回覆。