Ex-officer acquitted in Timor case<\/p>\n
Agence France-Presse, Jakarta<\/p>\n
The Supreme Court has upheld the acquittal of a former police
\nofficer charged with gross human rights violations in connection
\nwith two massacres in East Timor in 1999, an official said on
\nThursday.<\/p>\n
Three judges from a five-man panel rejected on Wednesday a
\nprosecution appeal against the acquittal of former Dili Police
\nchief Hulman Gultom, said an official with the Supreme Court's
\ncriminal appeals unit.<\/p>\n
\"The ruling was issued on Wednesday but a copy of it has not
\nyet been sent to prosecutors in the case,\" the official, who
\ndeclined to be named, told AFP.<\/p>\n
Militia gangs, which the United Nations has said were
\nrecruited and directed by Indonesia's military, went on an arson
\nand killing spree before and after the East Timorese voted for
\nindependence in a UN-sponsored ballot in August 1999.<\/p>\n
They killed about 1,400 independence supporters and laid waste
\nto much of the infrastructure in the half-island, which was a
\nPortuguese colony before Indonesia annexed and invaded it in the
\nmid-1970s.<\/p>\n
The country's human rights court sentenced Hulman to three
\nyears in jail in 2003 for failing to stop two attacks by Jakarta-
\nbacked militias in Dili in April and September 1999 and failing
\nto stop his subordinates joining in the assaults.<\/p>\n
That court said Hulman, who headed the Dili Police between
\nJune 1998 and September 1999, ignored militia attacks on the home
\nof pro-independence leader Manuel Carrascalao on April 17, and on
\nthe Dili diocese on Sept. 5, 1999.<\/p>\n
But last July the Jakarta human rights appellate court
\nacquitted Hulman, prompting prosecutors to appeal to the Supreme
\nCourt.<\/p>\n
Attorney General Abdul Rachman Saleh told AFP on Thursday he
\nwould ask the Supreme Court to carry out a judicial review of
\nHulman's case.<\/p>\n
An Indonesian tribunal set up to try military officers,
\nofficials and a former militia chief for atrocities in East Timor
\nhas drawn international criticism for failing to jail any
\nIndonesians, prompting calls for an international tribunal.<\/p>\n
Former militia chief Eurico Guterres remains the only
\ndefendant whose five-year jail appeal is still being discussed by
\nthe Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
Leaders of the two neighboring nations have rejected
\nprosecutions in favor of looking toward the future between tiny
\nEast Timor and the giant Indonesia.<\/p>\n
They have set up a bilateral commission of truth and
\nfriendship to address past right violations. East Timor gained
\nfull independence in May 2002 after more than two years of UN
\nstewardship.<\/p>",
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