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Zunar has been drawing editorial cartoons for the past twenty years in Malaysia.
Zunar uses his drawing pen as a weapon to fight state corruption and abuse of power.
He has turned the spotlight on local public-interest issues such as the politically explosive (literally!) and unsolved murder of a Mongolian woman, the political conspiracy against the former-deputy-prime-minister-turned-Opposition-Leader Anwar Ibrahim, the domineering wife of the present prime minister, and the Scorpene submarine purchases that are now being investigated in France.
The government-controlled national newspapers have blacked-out his cartoons since and he has to resort to publishing them online.
Zunar holds that when one's country is facing a moral crisis and is beset by corruption, abuse of power and violations of human rights, then it is one's duty to take a firm stand against those responsible for it.
As a cartoonist, Zunar feels compelled to show this stand in his work. There are no two ways to it: He must take the risk of fighting for change. Drawing cartoons, to him, becomes a fight for justice. As he puts it, "How can I be neutral, when even my pen has a stand?"
He has been arrested and detained for drawing cartoons that challenged official views.
Seven of his books are banned by the Malaysian government, his office has been raided twice by enforcers, the printing factories that print his books are constantly raided and vendors throughout the country are often warned not to sell his books.
