[JURIST] Malaysian police detained 21 lawyers, activists and opposition figures Sunday after nationwide raids in response to continuing demonstrations against the country's government. The police arrested 12 members of an opposition coalition for participating in a November 10 rally for electoral reforms [JURIST report]. The rally drew about 30,000 people and was part of a widening protest movement against the government of Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi [official website; BBC profile], who will soon be up for reelection. Officials detained eight other people, including four lawyers, earlier Sunday for participating in a small human-rights march, violating a ban on assembly and an order to disperse. The remaining detainee, a lawyer, was arrested [Malaysian Bar report] after trying to stop officials from removing posters marking International Human Rights Day. Badawi maintains that anti-government protests and demonstrations must stop because they benefit neither the government nor the Malaysian people. Nevertheless, Malaysian opposition parties plan to hold another protest Tuesday outside parliament, where protesters will submit a memorandum demanding free and fair elections.

Thousands of the nation's ethnic Indians held a protest against discrimination on November 25, drawing about the same number of demonstrators as the November 10 rally. Twenty-six ethnic Indians were later charged [JURIST report] with attempted murder for clashing with police at the rally. Badawi announced in late November that government authorities could rely on the country's controversial Internal Security Act (ISA) [HRW backgrounder] to halt protests. The ISA is a preventive detention law that allows the Malaysian government to detain suspects for two years without trial and to renew their detentions indefinitely. AP has more.

[JURIST] A lawyer for the first "high-value" Guantanamo Bay detainee to be allowed to meet privately with attorneys told AP Saturday that his client had been "subjected to state-sanctioned torture" in secret overseas CIA prisons. J. Wells Dixon [advocacy profile] has filed a federal court motion [text, PDF] seeking an order directing the US government to preserve evidence of the man's torture. The detainee, 27-year-old Pakistani Majid Khan [GlobalSecurity profile], is the only US resident among the 15 high-value detainees [official detainee profiles, PDF] at Guantanamo. Officials seized him in Pakistan in 2003 under allegations that he plotted to attack both the United States and Pakistan. The CIA held him in secret custody overseas until September 2006, when he was transferred to Guantanamo. Khan met with lawyers [press release] in October 2007. Khan's legal team says preservation of evidence of his torture could help show Khan had no ties to al-Qaida.

Wells' statement is not the first allegation of torture made in connection with Khan. In April, Khan's father submitted an affidavit to a Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT) convened to determine whether Khan was an "enemy combatant" [JURIST report]. In the affidavit, he wrote that "the Americans tortured him [Majid] for eight hours at a time, tying him tightly in stressful positions in a chair until his hands, feet and mind went numb." The CIA has denied the accusations and reiterated its position that the US does not torture suspects. AP has more.

[JURIST] The US Department of Justice [official website] and the CIA Inspector General announced Saturday they will conduct a joint preliminary investigation into the destruction of videotaped recordings of two terror suspects in 2005, which could then lead to a full investigation. The preliminary investigation will likely focus [AP report] on whether Jose Rodriguez, the then-director of the National Clandestine Service [official backgrounder] who apparently ordered the tapes' destruction in 2005, had the authority or the approval of any higher officials to do so. Meanwhile, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence [official website] also announced [text, PDF] its own investigation into the tapes' destruction. Committee Chairman Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) [official profile] said the committee would look into both the destruction of the tapes and the content of the tapes themselves. The US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence [official website] is also investigating the tapes.

Existence of the videotapes of "harsh interrogations" of two high-value detainees held by the CIA after 9/11 was verified in November after the CIA admitted it had mistakenly denied [JURIST report] that it had recorded interrogations, and in a letter [text; JURIST report] to CIA employees on Thursday, CIA Director Michael Hayden confirmed that the tapes had in fact been destroyed. Destruction of the tapes could affect both the defense and prosecution in trials of Guantanamo Bay detainees as evidence contained within them could cast doubt on, or solidify, the reliability of information obtained under harsh interrogation tactics. AP has more.

[JURIST] A national convention of Pakistani lawyers meeting in Lahore Saturday called on its members to boycott upcoming parliamentary elections in the country and urged political parties to do the same. The All Pakistan Lawyers' Representatives Convention said that efforts must be focused on restoring the suspended 1973 constitution and reinstating judges ousted after President Pervez Musharraf imposed emergency rule [JURIST news archive] on the country on November 3. The group unanimously passed resolutions refusing to recognize new judges appointed under the Provisional Constitution Order [text], condemning the eviction of the deposed judges from their official residences, and calling for the release of all lawyers still detained or under house arrest. It also condemned as unlawful recent changes to the Army Act allowing court-martial of civilians and amendments to the Legal Practitioners and Bar Council Act giving judges more disciplinary authority over lawyers.

Several judges ousted from the Lahore High Court were placed under house arrest prior to the convention in an apparent bid to stop them from attending. From Pakistan, the News has more.

9:15 PM ET - The lawyers' boycott call suffered a setback Sunday when ex-PM Nawaz Sharif, leader of the PML-N party, announced [statement] that he would contest the January 8 elections after failing to reach an agreement with ex-PM Benazir Bhutto's PPP on boycott terms. Sharif had urged Bhutto to forego the vote, but concluded that "any partial boycott would be disastrous for the opposition", insisting that "we must participate in the elections to block Mr. Musharraf's unconstitutional actions." BBC News has more.