SUHAKAM Report of Public Inquiry into the Incidents During and After the Public Assembly of 28 April 2012 6.13 The Panel is fully cognisant of the difficulties the police personnel may have in distinguishing the media personnel from the participants in any public assembly particularly one that may have turned chaotic. It is thus important that media personnel have proper identification and media tags to distinguish them from the participants and to enable the authorities to identify them. 6.14 The Panel however finds that the witnesses in question had proper tags identifying them as being from the media. 6.15 The Panel also observes that none of the media personnel who testified were wearing any items of clothing that might have suggested that they were participants of the assembly. 6.16 From the testimonies, the Panel observes that there was no evidence, whether verbal, documentary or audio-visual, that any of the media personnel acted or conducted themselves in a manner that could be construed as being out of order or beyond the boundaries of their roles and responsibilities. Neither was there any evidence that they posed any threats to the peace and security in the areas on that day. As such, the Panel is hard-pressed to find any basis for the police to act as they did in preventing the media personnel from covering the event, confiscating their equipment, deleting the photographs taken, or arresting or assaulting them. 6.17 Even assuming that the police personnel had no idea that the witnesses were from the media, there was no basis for treating them the way they did. 6.18 It would appear to the Panel that the police had acted in bad faith; indeed their actions would even suggest that there were deliberate attempts on the part of the police to prevent the media personnel from reporting and taking photographs of various incidences that happened that day, more specifically, those involving the police and the participants. These attempts at preventing the media from discharging their role and responsibilities are indeed regrettable and are clearly a breach of the fundamental right of expression and freedom of media. 6.19 What is even more regrettable are the testimonies of assaults and injuries inflicted upon the media personnel. In the absence of any response or rebuttal by PDRM the Panel accepts the testimonies of the witnesses, which were supported by medical reports and photographs. Accordingly, it is the finding of the Panel that the police did physically assault, injure, intimidate or manhandle media personnel Chen Shaua Fui (W150), Koh Jun Lin (W16), Mohd Radzi bin Abdul Razak (W17) and Puspanathan a/l Periannan (W20) who were covering the public assembly of 28 April 2012, even though attempts were made on their part to identify themselves as being from the media. 75