Critics of oppressive governments often end up defamed

ANYONE who accused a Malaysian government minister of sexual impropriety would quickly find himself in trouble. The government has charged critics and peaceful protesters with sedition, and criminalises speech deemed to be insulting or to breach “public tranquillity”. Yet Anwar Ibrahim, a charismatic former opposition leader, has spent years in prison on ridiculous trumped-up sodomy charges.

Critics of repressive governments often find themselves subjected to smears that, if they had been directed towards people within those governments, would have led to jail, the poorhouse or the morgue. A Russian who accuses a judge or policeman of being bought off, for instance, can be fined 2m roubles ($34,981), under a provision of Russian libel law that sets extra-stiff penalties for “defaming” courts, prosecutors or police.

And yet in March a spokesman for the president, Vladimir Putin, claimed, without citing any evidence, that young Russians who participated in anti-government protests had been paid. Some of their parents were reportedly charged with “improper parenting”. That is mild by Russian standards. People who cross the Kremlin have been accused of psychological instability and locked away in mental hospitals.

China’s government often charges its critics with apparently unconnected crimes that seem intended to besmirch their reputations. Zeng Feiyang, a labour activist in Guangdong, a southern province, was accused of embezzlement, fraud and adultery—charges his colleagues find implausible. Just before Hong Kong’s election in 2004, authorities charged an opposition politician with patronising prostitutes and sentenced him to six months detention. He later denied the charges and said he had been forced to confess.

China and North Korea have been accused of coercing and broadcasting confessions, presumably to destroy the reputations of those they accuse. Such tactics instil fear in a way that even jail sentences cannot. You can go to jail and emerge a martyr. But a family man convicted of frequenting prostitutes, or a labour activist paraded on television admitting embezzlement, is likely to lose his reputation for good.