Ex-RI envoy laments smear campaign<\/p>\n
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta<\/p>\n
Indonesia's former ambassador to the United Kingdom, Nana
\nSutresna, feels he and his family are being victimized after
\nreports surfaced that his son had been arrested for possession of
\ncocaine in London.<\/p>\n
Nana, who returned to Jakarta a fortnight ago, questioned here
\non Monday the motive behind the leaking of the report to the
\npress nearly a month after the incident occurred, particularly as
\nthe police themselves considered the case closed.<\/p>\n
According to Nana, the British Foreign Office and police in
\nLondon had \"found no grounds to pursue it further.\"<\/p>\n
\"The case has been completely closed,\" he added while pointing
\nout that many of the facts presented in the initial news report
\nin London's Evening Standard newspaper were totally erroneous.<\/p>\n
The newspaper in its April 24 edition claimed that Haris
\nSutresna, 20, had been arrested in a police raid on a flat in
\nHackney on March 28.<\/p>\n
He was detained after allegedly being found in possession of
\ncrack cocaine. According to the report, however, Haris was
\nreleased after invoking diplomatic immunity.<\/p>\n
The report alleged that the ambassador and his family were
\nthen summoned home as a result of the affair.<\/p>\n
Nana on Monday categorically refuted these accusations.<\/p>\n
He said that there had been no raid on the flat and that Haris
\nwas an innocent victim whom a group of men flung a package at as
\nhe arrived in his car at his college.<\/p>\n
All of a sudden, according to Nana, police immediately
\ndescended on Haris and detained him while the other men were not
\npursued.<\/p>\n
\"But the package was not his!,\" Nana asserted.<\/p>\n
When asked, Nana refused to speculate on whether Haris had
\nbeen framed in the incident given that the police were so quick
\nto arrive on the scene and apprehend him.<\/p>\n
There was also speculation that the details of the incident
\nwere only raised weeks later, after he had left, to humiliate the
\n68-year-old diplomat.<\/p>\n
While the 1963 Geneva Convention grants diplomats and their
\ndependents immunity from prosecution, serious criminal cases can
\nbe pursued further by the host country.<\/p>\n
Neither the British police nor the Foreign and Commonwealth
\nOffice requested that immunity to be lifted in this case.<\/p>\n
According to Nana, after the Indonesian Embassy in London
\nlodged a protest against the news article, which had quoted
\nunnamed sources from the police and foreign office, the Foreign
\nand Commonwealth Office expressed its regret over the incident.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/ex-ri-envoy-laments-smear-campaign-1447893297",
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