Said to be tried in Netherlands, says RI diplomat<\/p>\n
By K. Basrie<\/p>\n
THE HAGUE (JP): Mohamad Said, the Garuda Indonesia pilot
\nsuspected of attempting to smuggle 8,000 Ecstasy pills out of
\nSchiphol airport, will be tried soon in the Netherlands,
\naccording to an Indonesian diplomat.<\/p>\n
Information officer at the Indonesian embassy here Suhartono
\nHadikusumo told The Jakarta Post Wednesday the pilot was
\ncurrently being detained at a prison in Haarlem, waiting for
\nprosecutors to complete the dossiers on him.<\/p>\n
No specific date has been set by the local authorities for the
\ntrial, however. Citing local regulations, Suhartono said Mohamad
\nSaid could be detained at the Haarlem jail for the next two
\nmonths and tried in January.<\/p>\n
"But I'd like to say that he will be tried soon," said the
\nsenior diplomat without giving further details.<\/p>\n
An uproar over where the trial was to be held broke soon after
\nthe 49-year-old pilot was apprehended Sept. 29. Some Indonesian
\nofficials demanded that Said be returned to stand trial in
\nJakarta, citing that Indonesian laws permit an Indonesian court
\nto try Indonesians for crimes committed overseas.<\/p>\n
Dutch Ambassador to Indonesia Paul Reitze Brouwer, however,
\nmade clear early last month that Holland would not extradite Said
\nbecause it did not have any extradition treaty with Indonesia. He
\ncited several grounds for holding the trial in the Netherlands,
\nincluding the fact that distributing and possessing Ecstasy pills
\nis a crime in the Netherlands, and because the crime happened in
\nThe Hague.<\/p>\n
The old-fashioned Haarlem prison building with a huge dome is
\nsurrounded by residential houses and offices and easily noticed
\nby passers-by due to its height and eye-catching exterior design.<\/p>\n
Suhartono said he had no idea whether the prosecutors had
\nnamed other Indonesians to testify as witnesses in the case.<\/p>\n
According to de Telegraaf newspaper here, the Indonesian
\nsenior pilot told police investigators shortly after he was
\narrested that the drugs found in his possession were meant for a
\nrelative of a high-ranking officer in Jakarta.<\/p>\n
The daily said in its report on Oct. 8 that Said's dossiers,
\ncompleted by CID Inspector D. van Teijlingen, also mentioned the
\nalleged involvement of a secretary of the trade attache at the
\nIndonesian embassy here in a drug-trafficking syndicate.<\/p>\n
Jakarta responded to the report by instructing National Police
\nChief Lt. Gen. Dibyo Widodo to cut short his European tour and
\nskip a planned meeting with his counterpart in the Netherlands.<\/p>\n
The Indonesian embassy, Suhartono said, has maintained a low
\nprofile in relation to the daily's report.<\/p>\n
Asked whether the embassy considered filing a lawsuit,
\nSuhartono said: "It's useless, it would only lead us into further
\nserious polemics which, in turn, would only wreck the two
\ncountries' relations."<\/p>\n
The embassy has tried twice to deny the report but the paper
\napparently refused to publish its protest, he said.<\/p>\n
"In response to a letter dated Oct. 23 from the daily's
\nreporter, we sent our comments and in-depth explanation via fax
\non Oct. 25. None of it has been printed in the paper, thus far,"
\nhe said.<\/p>\n
Suhartono insisted that the embassy's investigation found no
\nproof of staff involvement in any crimes, including drug
\ntrafficking.<\/p>\n
"Thus, nobody has been suspended or fired," he said.<\/p>\n
In a related development, former police chief Gen. (ret)
\nAwaloedin Djamin, who is in the Netherlands on a personal visit,
\nsaid he was confused by the uproar over the arrest.<\/p>\n
"I still cannot understand why newspapers in Indonesia and the
\nNetherlands are making such a big deal of the arrest," he told
\nthe Post in Amsterdam.<\/p>\n
"The arrest of a drug trafficker is not big news and the
\ntreatment of such a criminal is normal to any police around the
\nworld," said Awaloedin, who is now an advisor to the police
\nforce.<\/p>\n
He urged that the authorities, instead, prevent the
\nestablishment of easy-to-build Ecstasy factories in Indonesia.<\/p>\n
According to Awaloedin, who paid a visit to the chief of the
\nNetherlands police, Gen. de Wijs, Wednesday, the Dutch police
\nhave learned how easy it is to produce Ecstasy pills.<\/p>\n
"The substance is easy to get and with a small van and a
\nnumber of tools, one could produce the pills and sell them at
\nhigh prices," he said.<\/p>",
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