Abdurrahman to sue two dailies

JAKARTA (JP): After threatening to take the nation to the brink of a state of emergency, President Abdurrahman Wahid on Sunday expressed his discontent at the press claiming he would file law suits against two dailies for allegedly spreading lies.

"I will file law suits against two newspapers in the country, because they have spread lies to the public," Abdurrahman said during a dialog on the reform movement with university students on Sunday.

Without identifying the newspapers in question, Abdurrahman said that he would file a suit against a newspaper that wrote that he had telephoned Supreme Court Justice Artidjo Alkausar to take up the position of Attorney General.

Abdurrahman maintained that he had never called Artidjo.

The other newspaper, according to Abdurrahman, had claimed that the President had broken the law.

"The reform movement has been going on for two years, so from now on whoever spreads lies will be brought to court," Abdurrahman stressed.

The President claimed that he had tried his best to respect and uphold freedom of expression ever since the beginning of the reform era as such freedoms were a major factor in boosting the democratization process.

"Back then I would never have filed a law suit against any reporters even though they had spread lies about me because I thought that if I did so, I would be stifling the press and this would be a return to the repressive era of New Order regime," he added.

However from now on, he said, he would uphold the law and demand a legal process to deal with newspapers which allegedly spread lies about him to the public.

Abdurrahman has repeatedly accused the media of "twisting" his statements. (dja)