Govt asked to put a stop to killing spree in E. Java<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Rights activists demanded on Friday that the
\ngovernment put a stop to the mysterious killing spree in East
\nJava which has claimed more than 150 lives, mostly of Islamic
\nteachers and suspected black magic practitioners.<\/p>\n
Baharuddin Lopa and fellow members of the National Commission
\non Human Rights told a news conference that the murders
\nconstituted gross violations of human rights. Some victims have
\nbeen hacked to pieces, trussed up or hanged from trees.<\/p>\n
\"The security apparatus and law enforcers ... (must)
\nimmediately stop these violations in order to return peace and
\nsecurity to the public,\" Lopa said. He was accompanied by rights
\nbody members B.N. Marbun and Clementino dos Reis Amaral.<\/p>\n
The commission sent a two-member team on Oct. 5 to the
\nprovince to obtain preliminary data.<\/p>\n
Police have arrested 334 people suspected of involvement in
\nthe murders, Antara reported on Friday.<\/p>\n
The news agency quoted East Java Police chief Maj. Gen. M.
\nDayat as saying that 157 of those detained were in Banyuwangi,
\nthe district hardest-hit by the bloodshed.<\/p>\n
\"For the time being, the cases (of the suspects) are purely
\ncriminal,\" Dayat said in the provincial capital of Surabaya.<\/p>\n
He did not rule out the possibility that political motives
\nbehind the killings could emerge during trials.<\/p>\n
Religious and military leaders, including Abdurrahman Wahid,
\nleader of the 30-million-strong Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) Moslem
\norganization, have expressed suspicions that conflicts within the
\ncountry's political elites lay behind the violence.<\/p>\n
Beginning in September, the killers initially targeted people
\nsuspected of practicing black magic, but Moslem preachers and
\nteachers have been subsequent victims.<\/p>\n
There have been reprisals against individuals suspected of
\nbeing members of the \"ninjas\", so called because the killers are
\nusually masked and attired in black. Mobs in several East Java
\ndistricts have set upon at least 24 people, killing 10 of them.<\/p>\n
The severed heads of two suspected killers were paraded
\nthrough the streets in the town of Malang.<\/p>\n
M.M. Billah of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims
\nof Violence (Kontras) warned Friday that there are \"free riders\"
\nexploiting the climate of fear in East Java.<\/p>\n
\"They are trying to create mass insecurity,\" Billah said,
\nreferring to threats against Moslem preachers and journalists
\nreporting the mysterious killings.<\/p>\n
Billah did not identify the parties involved.<\/p>\n
In Surabaya, activists from the Movement of Indonesian Moslem
\nStudents staged a protest on Friday at the regional police
\nheadquarters. They demanded an immediate end to the murders.<\/p>\n
In Yogyakarta, about 4,000 members of NU task force and 2,000
\nothers from the National Mandate Party (PAN) were put on alert
\nFriday following death threats against local religious leaders.<\/p>\n
Several Moslem preachers in the Central Java towns of Cilacap
\nand Purbalingga were also terrorized on Thursday by unidentified
\npeople.<\/p>\n
At least one Islamic boarding school in the Kesugihan district
\nin Cilacap, Al Ihya Ulumuddin, and houses of its leaders
\nMustholih Badawi and Chasbullah Badawi were stoned by
\nunidentified people.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Minister of Cooperatives and Small Enterprises Adi
\nSasono categorically denied on Friday an allegation that he or
\nsome other Cabinet members were involved in the killings.<\/p>\n
The minister argued he had long been the target of such rumors
\nwhich were always proved false.<\/p>\n
\"Do you believe that a Cabinet member still has time to carry
\nout the killings of alleged santet sorcerers? It is illogical,
\nand absurd,\" Adi said after attending the Economic and Financial
\nResilience Council meeting at the State Guest House.<\/p>\n
Abdurrahman Wahid, better known as Gus Dur, has claimed that
\nsome members of the Cabinet masterminded the murder spree.
\n(byg\/nur\/23\/44\/45\/prb)<\/p>",
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