KUALA LUMPUR: A Muslim model who will be caned for drinking beer said yesterday she asked Malaysian authorities to punish her in public instead of in a prison, but they refused to go against official procedures.

Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno is scheduled next week to be the first woman in this Muslim-majority country to be flogged under Islamic law after she was arrested in a raid and sentenced by a Shariah court for drinking alcohol at a hotel lounge last year. The 32-year-old was also fined 5,000 ringgit ($1,400) last month after she pleaded guilty. The law provides for a three-year prison term and caning for Muslims caught drinking, but most offenders are fined. Drinking is legal for non-Muslims.

"I want to send a message that I really regret what I did, so I want to be punished in front of other people," Kartika said in a telephone interview from her northern home state of Perak. "If other Muslims can see me being caned, I hope it will convince them not to drink."

Kartika said prison officials turned down her request yesterday, saying she will be lashed six times with a rattan cane. "I also requested for journalists to witness the caning in prison but it is not allowed," she said.

Kartika, who has lived in Singapore for 15 years after marrying a citizen of the city-state, denied using her sentencing as a way to boost her part-time modeling career. "I am not thinking about popularity or modeling, I am only thinking about my religion and want to tell Muslims to stay away from alcohol," she said.

AP - AFP

(China Daily 08/21/2009 page10)