In much of Asia, race is just too hard to talk about

IN HIS POMP as a cantankerous prime minister of Malaysia (1981-2003 and 2018-20), Mahathir Mohamad would speak for a continent. “Asian values are universal values. European values are European values,” he declared in 1996. These days, as a cantankerous 97-year-old troublemaker, Dr Mahathir tends to speak for just one of his country’s ethnic groups, the majority Malays, who, he tweeted on March 9th, “get nothing from multiracialism”. This was part of a long thread attacking Malaysia’s Chinese and Indian minorities for failing, in his view, to adapt to Malay culture.