KUALA LUMPUR - About 5,000 Malaysian Muslims rallied at a stadium near Kuala Lumpur on Saturday in a move to defend their religion and protest against what they saw as a trend of proselytization among Muslims in the country.

They were also pressing for new laws to penalize those who try to convert Muslims.

The turnout at the rally, organised by 25 non-governmental groups, was short of the one million that organizers had expected.

The event was peaceful, with religious hymn recitals and speeches by clergies taking the centre stage.

"Muslims have to be more united and I am here to support the call for us to be protected from attempts of proselytism but I am not opposing other religions," said one of the attendees, Zamzuri Abdul Rahman.

Religion is a very sensitive issue in Malaysia because of its multiracial background.

Some believed Saturday's rally was sparked by a controversial raid by the Selangor state religious authorities at a dinner in a church where Muslims attended.

Organizers of the rally said they are concerned about the trend of apostasy among Muslims.

"We are co-existing with people of other faith and religion and we want to convey a message that we don't want to be intruded. We want people to understand that there is an agreement in the constitution that you cannot spread religious teachings other than Islam to the Muslims," Mohammad Azmi Abdul Hamin, lead organizer of rally told reporters.

Early last year, a high court's judgment to allow a Malay- language edition of a Catholic publication to use the word "Allah" in reference to the Christian God outraged many among the Muslim community who insisted the word is exclusive to Islam.

Several churches were vandalized.

60 percent of Malaysia's 28 million population are Muslims, followed by 19 percent of Buddhists, 9 percent Christians and 6 percent of Hindu and other Chinese religions.