MARANG, Malaysia - Taking his fight to the heartland of his biggest opponents, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Friday accused Islamic fundamentalist opposition leaders of abusing the religion and called their supporters sinners.
Mahathir traveled to eastern Terengganu state for a one-off political rally in the electoral district of the leader of the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, which governs the state and is battling Mahathir's government for support among the predominant ethnic Malay Muslims.
Before a crowd of about 4,000 people, mostly supporters of his United Malays National Organization, Mahathir accused the fundamentalist party's leaders of twisting Islam's teachings and preaching that followers would enter heaven if they supported the party.
"This is not Islamic," Mahathir told the rally, according to the Bernama national news agency.
"Those who follow PAS are ... sinful and will receive their punishment in the hereafter," Mahathir was quoted as saying, using the fundamentalist party's Malay-language acronym.
It was Mahathir's first trip to the fundamentalists' stronghold in Malaysia's rural north and east since a by-election battle last month in northern Kedah state. Mahathir's party narrowly won a federal district, but lost a state parliamentary seat.
Mahathir is fighting to win back ethnic Malay supporters after the fundamentalists surged at the last general election in 1999, tripling their seats in federal parliament and taking control of a second of Malaysia's 13 states.
The next general election is scheduled to be held before 2004.
About two-thirds of Malaysia's 23 million population are ethnic Malay Muslims. Large ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities, mostly Christians, Buddhists and Hindus, make up most of the rest.
Support for the fundamentalists has waned since 1999, thanks in part to Mahathir's strong stance against terrorism. Authorities have arrested scores of suspected Islamic militants — some of them members of the Islamic party — who are alleged to be members of a regional network with links to al-Qaida.
The Islamic party denies having any links to extremist groups.
It was also Mahathir's first visit to Terengganu since the fundamentalist state government passed a strict Islamic criminal code that includes stoning, amputation and whipping as punishments. The laws have been blocked by Mahathir's government, which says they are unconstitutional.
Friday's rally was held in Marang town, about 240 kilometers (150 miles) northeast of Kuala Lumpur in the district held by Terengganu's chief minister Abdul Hadi Awang, the fundamentalist party's leader.