The Emergency
In Peninsular Malaya many Chinese were angered by the change of the status of the country from a colony to a federation, in which they effectively became second-class citizens. According to the new laws, non-Malays could only qualify as citizens if they had lived in the country for fifteen out of the last twenty-five years, and they also had to prove they spoke Malay or English. More Chinese began to identify with the MCP , which, under its new leader, Chin Peng , wanted to set up a Malayan republic. Peng established guerrilla cells deep in the jungle, and, from June 1948, launched sporadic attacks on rubber estates, killing planters and employees, and spreading fear among rural communities. The period of unrest, which lasted from 1948 to 1960, was referred to as the Emergency , rather than a civil war, which it undoubtedly was. The British were slow to respond until lieutenant-general Sir Harold Briggs enacted the resettlement of 400,000 rural Chinese - mostly squatters who had moved to the jungle borders to escape the Japanese - as well as thousands of Orang Asli seen as potential MCP sympathizers in 400 "New Villages", scattered across the country. This made both Chinese and Orang Asli more sympathetic to the idea of a Communist republic replacing British rule. The violence peaked in 1950 with ambushes and attacks on plantations near Ipoh, Kuala Kangsar, Kuala Lipis and Raub, and the assassination of the British high commissioner to Malaya. In 1956, Peng and most of the remaining cell members fled over the border to Thailand where they received sanctuary; some still live there and only formally admitted defeat in 1989.
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