British woman accused of stripping naked on Malaysia's Mt Kinabalu faces three months in jail
The lawyer of a British woman arrested in Malaysia after posing naked for photographs on Mount Kinabalu has requested she and three other western tourists are held separately amid fears for their safety.
Eleanor Hawkins was one of 10 trekkers who stripped off on the mountain on 30 May in a stunt that a local official said was insulting to indigenous people, suggesting it may even be considered the cause of the deadly earthquake days later.
Hawkins, 23, was arrested at Tawau airport on Tuesday before she was due to depart for Kuala Lumpur. She appeared in court on Wednesday together with a Dutch tourist, Dylan Snel, and two Canadian siblings, Lindsey and Danielle Petersen, court sources have confirmed.
The four were remanded for four days pending further investigations into alleged indecency. Their lawyer, Ronny Cham, said he requested they be held separately for their own safety, because of the level of public anger in Malaysia generated by the alleged stunt.
Officials in Sabah state, in the northern half of the island of Borneo, accused the tourists of showing “disrespect to the sacred mountain”, which at 4,095 metres is south-east Asia’s highest peak.
Sabah’s indigenous Kadazan Dusun people believe the tourists’ behaviour angered the spirit of the mountain and was the reason for a 5.9-magnitude earthquake, which six days later struck near the mountain, killing 18 climbers.
Hawkins was third to enter the court, as the group was ushered in handcuffed together and dressed in purple prison uniforms.
The four were remanded until 14 June. Cham said they are likely to be charged with “causing annoyance by conducting obscene acts in a public place”.
He said if found guilty they could face three months in prison, or a fine, or both. He said if charged, the defence is likely to argue that the top of the mountain should not be defined as a public place where annoyance could be caused to the public.
Cham accused local state officials of stoking a public backlash against the tourists. He said: “I ask the court they be held in separate custody from other detainees. Because of the sentiment in this case, we want to protect their safety. People are laying blame on them for offending the mountain. There is a lot of stupidity involved and unfortunately politicians have jumped on the bandwagon to condemn them for causing the earthquake, which is ridiculous.”
Hawkins’ father, Tim Hawkins, who runs his own business in Derby, said: “I would like to appeal to the Malaysian authorities. I have got every faith in their judicial system. I just hope they don’t make an example of them after the tragic earthquake.”
Tim Hawkins told the Guardian that he spoke to his daughter on Wednesday morning: “She is obviously upset. She’s pretty scared. But it was good to speak to her.”
The Foreign Office in London confirmed that a British national had been arrested and consular assistance was being provided.
Sabah’s deputy chief minister, Joseph Pairin Kitingan, said a special ritual will be conducted to “appease the mountain spirit”.
Sabah’s state tourism minister, Masidi Manjun, tweeted that legal proceedings against the four foreigners had begun and that they would be remanded for four days.
Masidi said the suggestion that the tourists’ actions had caused the earthquake was “misconstrued”.
“I never said that they actually caused the earthquake, but their actions were against the people of the largest tribe in Sabah. The mountain is a revered and sacred site,” he said.
