Malaysia to set up body to monitor police

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia will set up an independent body to probe complaints against the police following recent reports of detainees being forced to strip naked and squat.   

"The commission will be effective as soon as possible," Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi told a news conference on Tuesday.   

Establishment of the commission, along with expected sweeping police reforms, follows two damning independent inquiry reports on the police force. An independent body on police misconduct was among the recommendations.   

Calls for change have intensified since a video clip, believed to have been recorded by a policeman on his mobile phone, was leaked last year showing a female prisoner being made to strip and squat as a policewoman looked on.   

The case - dubbed "Malaysia's Abu Ghraib" after the Iraqi jail scandal - sparked a brief diplomatic row with China, as the woman was initially believed to be Chinese.   

Malaysian police chief Bakri Omar said that police would give their full support.   

"We welcome the setting up of the commission and give an assurance that my men will give their full cooperation should they be called to explain," he was quoted saying by the Star newspaper.