Salah Salem Saleh Sulaiman seems like an improbable purveyor of "fake news."
He doesn't run a troll farm or a website designed to spread propaganda. He's not on a mission to destroy a politician or artist. He's not even a journalist.
But this week, he was sentenced to a week in jail for a YouTube video he made, the first casualty of Malaysia's "fake news" law.
It's the first law of its kind in the world.
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But critics of the Malaysian government saw something else - intentionally vague legislation that will make it easy for politicians and leaders to get rid of stories they don't like. In effect, they say, the government has the power to decide what is and isn't true.
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The law's opponents point out some suspicious timing - the measure was passed just months before the May elections, and while Prime Minister Najib Razak is being investigated for diverting billions of dollars from Malaysia's state investment fund.
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Sulaiman, a Danish citizen of Yemeni descent, said he'd been in Malaysia for less than two weeks when he was arrested.
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Sulaiman also said that he called the police, and that it took an hour for an ambulance to arrive.
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Two days after he posted his video, Sulaiman was charged "with ill intent, published fake news through a video on YouTube."
At his trial, Sulaiman told the judge that he was in Malaysia on vacation from Denmark for about two weeks. He didn't know about the new law. He apologized but was convicted of "maliciously publishing false information."
Sulaiman was sentenced to at least a week in jail. He said he was unable to pay the $2,500 fine, which means he'll serve a month in jail instead. It's not the worst punishment Sulaiman could have faced. Offenders can be sentenced to up to six months in jail and fined $128,000.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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