Despite the Sedition Act 1948 undergoing a review, three areas are still considered seditious in the country and will not be touched in the review, Berita Harian reports today.

These three are ridiculing or deriding the Yang di-Pertuan Agong or the Malay rulers; creating racial unrest or uncertainty; and questioning the rights, stature, special privileges or prerogatives that are safeguarded in the federal constitution.

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak said these three principles would remain in the Act despite the evolution of new legislation or amendments to existing laws in order to avoid disrupting national security.

Najib said when tabling the new Security Offences (Special Measures) Bill 2012 for its second reading in Parliament yesterday that the Sedition Act review was one of the initiatives under the National Political Transformation.

The prime minister also indicated that a new law would replace the Printing Presses and Publications Act to remove the need for annual permits for newspapers and to set up a media council.

Utusan Malaysia in its report said the new legislation and a review of the existing laws underlined the governent's commitment to political trasnformation.

The New Straits Times, on its part, quoted Najib as saying that while new laws were made, it was also crucial to tackle behaviours or actions that could incite hatred or contempt towards the Yang di-Pertuan Agong and the Malay rulers.