The local media, especially Chinese dailies, had taken a racial slant in their coverage of the nude ear squats scandal, said Deputy Information Minister Zainuddin Maidin.

"The people who raised the issue lumped the woman with the four women Chinese nationals detained in other cases," he was quoted as saying in a Bernama report yesterday.

On Tuesday, the woman had testified before the independent commission set-up to probe the incident and confirmed that she was a Malaysian and Malay.

Earlier, it was widely speculated that the victim, who was forced to do the ear squats at the Petaling Jaya police headquarters, was a Chinese national.

The incident became controversial after a video clip of it was made public by a DAP parliamentarian, sparking a public outcry.

Zainuddin said the issue was sensationalised by newspapers in Hong Kong and Taiwan because of their misconception that Chinese nationals were being mistreated based on the reactions in Malaysia.

The deputy minister also took a swipe at opposition leader Lim Kit Siang.

"The statement by Opposition Leader Lim Kit Siang accusing Deputy Minister of Internal Security Noh Omar of preventing Parliament from getting the true information on the nationality of the woman doing the ear squats is influenced more by the feeling of being found wrong and as a champion of prejudice.

"Lim wanted to divert attention from the DAP's mistake in hastily championing human rights which had caused the misconception of Malaysia abroad," he said.

Zainuddin said the issue was seen from the perspective of prejudice against a certain race in plural Malaysia and not from the viewpoint of human rights.

"The excitement over the issue caused the press to forget their longstanding ethic of providing only the names and not identifying the race in court and crime reports.

"This incident should be a lesson to the Malaysian press which are eager to see issues from the narrow perspective of race to act more cautiously in future," he said.

Dignity and integrity

Meanwhile, Women, Family and Community Development Minister Sharizat Abdul Jalil said the central issue in the investigation of a woman detainee by the authorities must be her dignity and integrity and not her nationality or race.

"This issue should be given proper attention and consideration irrespective of skin colour, religion or nationality of the detainee," she said when commenting on the same case.

"The dignity of the detainee should be protected and respected in whatever kind of case and situation," she added.

Shahrizat said she knew the police had been using their own methods or practices in searching a detained person for a long time but she hoped the methods chosen would be appropriate to the type of case or offence.

She expressed full confidence that the independent commission appointed to investigate the incident would be able to come up with better methods of body search of detainees, especially women.