Acquittal of senior officers condemned

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The acquittal of two senior police officers from all charges of gross human rights violations in Abepura, Papua province, drew public condemnation on Friday.

Earlier in the day, the Human Rights Tribunal in Makassar, South Sulawesi, exonerated Sr. Comr. Daud Sihombing from charges of committing serious human rights abuses in connection with a 2002 incident in Abepura, some 20 kilometers south of the Papua capital, Jayapura.

The same court also acquitted another senior police officer on Thursday, Brig. Gen. Johny Wainal Usman, who is currently the National Police's Mobile Brigade (Brimob) chief. He was commander of Papua Brimob at the time of the incident.

"This decision shows that the state continues to retain impunity (for top security officers) after freeing almost all defendants in human rights cases in East Timor and Tanjung Priok (in North Jakarta)," said a joint statement from several human rights groups.

No senior military or police officers were convicted of crimes against humanity in East Timor in the violence that followed its people voting for independence from Indonesia in 1999, and in Tanjung Priok when soldiers fired shots at Muslim protesters in 1984.

"The acquittal shows that the state has failed to provide a sense of justice to the victims of human rights violations," said M. Arfiandi Fauzan from the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI) in the statement.

Signatories of the statement also included seasoned activists of other human rights groups such as Kontras, Impartial and Elsam.

The NGOs, grouped in the Coalition of Civil Society for the Abepura Case, said the court verdicts in favor of the senior police officers undermined the psychological stance of the Papuans whose rights were abused.

The coalition urged the Attorney General's Office to appeal against the verdicts to the Supreme Court and demanded the Judiciary Commission investigate the judges hearing the Abepura case.

"The state should invite special judiciary rapporteurs to assess the process of human rights trials in Indonesia," the statement added, calling on the government to compensate the Abepura victims and rehabilitate them.

The coalition also questioned the lengthy trials for the senior police officers, as well as their venue, which it said should have been held in Papua instead of Makassar.

The NGOs also slammed the authorities for not keeping the suspects in custody for the duration of the trials, saying that it was even more strange that they were promoted during their trials.

More over, the coalition said it intended to take the case to an international human rights tribunal.

Hasbi, who chairs the Makassar Legal Aid Institute (LBH Makassar), also condemned the verdicts, pointing to flaws in the trial and investigation, including the failure to reconstruct the incident.

The court, he said, failed to take into account Law No. 26/2000 on human rights violations, particularly regarding the line of command within the police force.

Instead, he added, the panel of judges adopted Article 340 of the Criminal Code on premeditated murder.

"It was a crime against humanity and gross human rights violation, not a regular crime," Hasbi said.

The Abepura incident took place in 2000, after 30 residents armed with sharp weapons attacked and set fire to the Abepura Police station. A policeman was killed and three others were wounded in the attack.

In a separate attack on the Irian Jaya autonomy office in Abepura, a security officer was killed.

In a retaliatory move, Abepura Police officers, assisted by Jayapura Mobile Brigade personnel, began hunting down the attackers.

During the ensuing raids, police arrested and reportedly assaulted and physically abused at least 99 people, who they claimed were suspects in the police station attack. Three people were reportedly killed in the raids.

Commenting on the court ruling, the National Solidarity for Papua said that the rest of the country should not be surprised if Papuans wanted their independence.

"The court verdicts on the Abepura case hurt the victims and their families, as well as other Papuans in general. The decisions showed once again that Indonesia is a safe haven for human rights violators," it said in a press release.