Jailed ex-deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim launches his final bid for freedom today when the country's highest court begins hearing his appeal against a sodomy conviction.

If he fails, he will remain in prison, where he has already served five years on a corruption charge, until at least 2009.

Anwar also told reporters that the judges hearing his appeal were "handpicked and will be given swift promotion after they convict me".

He accused Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi of continuing to control a judiciary cowed by his predecessor Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who retired last October.

"(Abdullah) is hiding behind the courts. (Mahathir) destroyed the judiciary and he has appointed a person to ensure the system remains," Anwar said.

He was speaking after the court adjourned briefly to consider a demand by Anwar's lawyers that two of them should disqualify themselves from the hearing.

The ousted politician told reporters and a group of international observers and foreign diplomats that he did not believe he would get a fair hearing.

"Once we knew (who the judges were), I lost faith. There are more senior, credible judges around," he said.

International pressure

Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the International Commission of Jurists have called the charges against him politically motivated.

The international human rights watchdogs in a statement on Saturday called for a fair hearing for the former deputy prime minister.

Today's hearing is Anwar's "last chance at freedom," said Ingrid Massage, director of Amnesty International's Asia Program.

"It is time that the injustices that marked the arrest, trial and imprisonment of Anwar Ibrahim be set right."

"Both the trials and appeals were marred by serious violations of due process," the three rights groups said in a statement from New York.

"The prosecution repeatedly amended the charges against Anwar in an apparent attempt to nullify Anwar's alibi, and government witnesses made contradictory statements about their contacts with the accused," they said.

No confidence

Anwar's supporters say the appeal is a test of new Prime Minister Abdullah's commitment to the independence of the judiciary, but the imprisoned politician is reportedly pessimistic.

"My client says he has no confidence in the Malaysian judiciary and he doesn't expect to win," lawyer Sankara Nair told AFP.

Former prime minister Mahathir sacked the charismatic and popular Anwar in 1998 and he was later jailed on charges he says were trumped up to prevent him from making a challenge for the premiership.

"Anwar was put in jail because of Mahathir's political vendetta against him," said Sam Zarifi, Deputy Director of Human Rights Watch's Asia Division.

"The Federal Court needs to make sure that Anwar will finally get what he should've gotten in 1998: a chance to answer the charges against him without the outcome being a foregone conclusion."

His trials were widely condemned by legal experts as flawed, and the United States and Amnesty International list him as a political prisoner.

Anwar's supporters had hoped that Mahathir's retirement last October presented a chance for Anwar to receive a pardon or at least what they would consider a fair hearing in court, but these hopes have faded.

The Parti Keadilan Rakyat (Keadilan), headed by Anwar's wife Dr Wan Azizah Ismail, says it fears that Abdullah is "determined to preserve Dr Mahathir's legacy of blatant intervention in the judicial process".

Street protests

A statement by the party's vice president, Tian Chua, said the three judges selected to hear the appeal were "relatively junior", suggesting this was part of the "pattern of manipulation of the judiciary (that) has persisted throughout all levels of the Anwar trial".

Several independent observers representing law associations from around Asia are expected to attend the appeal hearing, but Anwar's case has lost the international spotlight it once held.

Even at home, concern over the man once considered certain to succeed Mahathir appears to have faded.

While his sacking sparked street protests by thousands of his supporters, the party formed to press his cause, Keadilan, was virtually wiped out by Abdullah's ruling coalition in elections in March.

The Federal Court will also consider an application Anwar has made for bail to enable him to receive medical treatment abroad for a back injury which he says he sustained during a beating by police.

The hearing is expected to last up for to three days. - AFP