ABRI 'must reveal truth behind riots'

JAKARTA (JP): President B.J. Habibie told top brass in the Armed Forces (ABRI) to dig out the truth over allegations that "an organized group" was behind recent riots.

Addressing a meeting of 151 high-ranking ABRI officials at the State Presidential Palace yesterday, Habibie said the Armed Forces headquarters should conduct a thorough investigation and clarify the issue.

"I particularly ask the Armed Forces leadership to reveal the truth over allegations that an organized group was seen inciting people to burn and loot buildings in several areas where disturbances occurred," Habibie said.

Opposition leader Amien Rais told a gathering of 2,000 Chinese-Indonesians in Surakarta, Central Java, on Wednesday that the riots which hit Jakarta and Surakarta in the middle of last month were not spontaneous.

"There were people who masterminded the riots in Jakarta and Solo (Surakarta)," he said.

Calls for an immediate government investigation into the mid- May unrest have also come from the Coordinating Body for National Unity (Bakom PKB) and the Indonesian New Brotherhood Association (Persabi).

"The government must conduct an investigation into the mid-May riots, find the provocateurs and announce the results of the investigation," Rosita S. Noer, a Bakom PKB leader, said Wednesday.

"If the government fails to clarify what happened, Bakom PKB will invite an international human rights organization to conduct the investigation," she added.

Meanwhile, Persabi asked the government to conduct a thorough investigation into the riots.

President Habibie said he understood that the Armed Forces Headquarters resources and personnel had been overstretched by the massive unrest.

"The Armed Forces Headquarters should therefore draw on the people's support, as stipulated in the security and defense Sishankamrata doctrine," he said.

Official military reports said the death toll from the four days of riots reached 499 in Greater Jakarta alone.

The National Commission on Human Rights, however, came up with a figure which was more then twice as high. The rights commission announced last week that at least 1,188 people were killed during the riots.

Separately, Minister of Defense and Security/Armed Forces Commander Gen. Wiranto declined to comment on Amien's allegations.

"It's better that I do not respond to such allegations when they are made as an open statement to newspapers because it will only as it will only create more speculation," he told reporters after chairing a military leadership meeting at the Armed Forces Cilangkap headquarters late yesterday afternoon.

"ABRI is open to inputs from anybody, but such tenuous allegations should not have been published in newspapers," he said.

However, he guaranteed that the Armed Forces Headquarters would conduct an investigation.

Wiranto dismissed speculation that the Armed Forces itself was behind the riots as a means of regaining their grip of security and order in the nation, a grip which prior to the riots had been strongly challenged by anti-government student demonstrations.

"It has never been Armed Forces' strategy to politically engineer a situation at the expense of peace and people's welfare," he said.

During yesterday's briefing, President Habibie, in his capacity as ABRI supreme commander, warned that riot victims had become a sensitive issue, not only in Indonesia, but also among the international community.

"Human rights are no longer an issue that should be suppressed. They have now become a universal catalyst for state progress," Habibie said.

"I hope that ABRI leaders will continue to learn ... the various United Nations human rights pacts which we will gradually ratify," Habibie noted. (prb/imn)