Rights groups have accused the Malaysian government of using repressive laws to suppress free speech and critical voices, with Amnesty International reporting that between January 2020 and June 2022, there were 87 prosecutions of individuals including artists, performers and political activists.
Note that under article 3 of Interpol’s constitution, “it is strictly forbidden for the organization to undertake any intervention or activities of a political, military, religious or racial character.”
Interpol’s legal team will take one look at Malaysia’s request, laugh, and then respectfully decline to assist. They won’t be wasting any of their resources on this.
Malaysia has no power to actually do anything about this, so I think they’re just trying to use strong rhetoric to have a chilling effect on anyone who’s thinking about making similar jokes.
I was talking about Malaysia’s resources. Exactly for this reason. The fact that they’re even going to make a request is already a waste of time (therefore resources) for them. + anything else they choose to do.