Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - Malaysia's government has banned the mainstream media from reporting on the highly sensitive issue of whether the country is an Islamic state, an official said Friday.
Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak sparked a storm last week when he declared that mostly Muslim Malaysia was not secular but an Islamic state that protects the religious rights of minority groups.
Government leaders, opposition parties, lawyers and activists condemned Najib's comment, saying Malaysia was set up as a secular state by the country's first leaders after independence from Britain in 1957.
The Internal Security Ministry issued a directive to all mainstream media to stop reporting on the issue, said a ministry official, who asked not to be named because of the sensitive nature of the issue.
"We want to stop this issue being aggravated into becoming a public debate as this will create tension," he told The Associated Press. "This is a very sensitive issue... As far as possible, we want to prevent (any racial) tension."
The official said the media are allowed to publish comments by Najib and Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi but statements from anyone else should be disregarded.
"This debate will be never ending," he said, adding the ban was "for the sake of peace and harmony."
Any media outlet that violated the ban could be suspended, he warned.
Opposition leader Lim Kit Siang slammed the government ban, describing it as the "gravest blow to press freedom" since Abdullah took over as premier in late 2003.
The opposition People's Justice Party called for the ban to be rescinded, saying it was harmful to democracy.
"A country, which allows only the voice of the prime minister and his deputy to be reported on national policies and matters of public interest, is in grave danger of tilting toward authoritarianism," it said in a statement.
Despite the government ban, the issue remains a hot topic among Malaysian bloggers.
The controversy arose amid a recent string of religious disputes that have ended in favor of Muslims — who comprise nearly 60 percent of the population — and strained ethnic relations in the multicultural nation, which has enjoyed racial peace for nearly four decades.
Ethnic Chinese, who are mostly Buddhist or Christian, account for about one-quarter of Malaysia's 26 million people, and Hindu, Buddhist and Christian Indians comprise about 10 percent.