Malaysian mountain moving

Waimarino Bulletin, Volume 6, Issue 228, 26 January 1988, Page 2

Malaysian mountain moving

Two little New Zealand addicts went to a Malaysian market, bought drugs, stashed them in bra and held them in the elastic of their knickers. After two years of pretrial imprisonment, and a world-televised trial in which were revelations of drug discrepancies, alleged corruption by a prosecution officer, himself awaiting trial, and memorable histrionics of a judge who failed to properly record evidence vital to a fair hearing, the defence attorney was detained for up to two years for political reasons. The potential for comic

opera was there - but Lorraine and Aaron Cohen will not drop lifeless from the scaffold to play another bit part next day ... Traffickers have sophisticated ways of moving drugs. What punishment is reserved for them? Or can million-dollar boys buy their way out? Justice demands that the Cohens be freed. Lorraine's body, shown on television, is a tapestry of evidence of a twentyyear addiction during which she repeatedly cried for help from New Zealand and Australian doctors and institutions. Where we failed the hell of cold turkey in a Malaysian cell succeeded. Many New Zealand families have members addicted

to some drug or other. Do we approve of death for those whose craving is sustained by law breaking? Our government, helpful to French agents of death, will only wag an admonitory finger when nooses are tightening, to say: "We don't do that there 'ere." So I ask readers to seek a royal pardon for the Cohens. The simplest letter: The Supreme Head of State, His Majesty the King, Malaysia: Please pardon Lorraine and Aaron Cohen, Penang Prison. Yours respectfully (add name, address, country). Eloquent pens please enlarge. Let's move a Malaysian mountain together.

Laneth

McKinnon