Activists warn rights trial may ruin judiciary's image

Activists warn rights trial may ruin judiciary's image

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Human rights activists warned on Friday of another red mark
against the country's judicial system should the ad hoc Human
Rights Tribunal fail to hold a fair trial on the 1999 East Timor
human rights abuses.

Noted lawyer Todung Mulya Lubis said on Friday that the
prosecutors, in addition to their lack of knowledge and
experience, have failed to produce strong evidence or key
witnesses and expert witnesses who could help prove the charges
of crimes against humanity.

"Such a condition will become a major impediment for the
judges, who also have the opportunity to understand about a human
rights trial and to reach a decision that conforms with the
universal principles of a human rights trial," Todung told The
Jakarta Post.

He said up until now the human rights trial appeared to be
another venue that could strain both diplomatic ties with the
international community and donor countries.

Todung blamed this on the 2000 law on human rights tribunal
which allows only retired state and military prosecutors to
become ad hoc prosecutors.

Meanwhile, National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM)
secretary-general Asmara Nababan pointed out on Friday that the
defense side had succeeded in producing witnesses who supported
their counter argument that the rights abuses were a spontaneous
reaction to what they considered to be foreign intervention in
the East Timor issue.

"The prosecutors should be active in producing representatives
from the United Nations to the court to explain the role of the
UN Mission in East Timor (UNAMET) that organized the referendum.

"What the court has been hearing up until now only comes from
one side. It's dangerous...The judges may not secure the whole
truth," Asmara told the Post on Friday.

The ad hoc Human Rights Tribunal is now examining seven
suspects believed to be responsible for a number of deadly
attacks against pro-independence supporters before and after the
United Nations-sponsored referendum on Aug. 30, 1999, in which
the East Timorese overwhelmingly voted to break away from
Indonesia.

Prosecutors will soon submit five other cases.

A total of 18 senior officials and military personnel,
including three Army generals, have been declared suspects in the
rampage.

The 18 suspects are mostly charged with neglecting their duty
to prevent the murder, torture, and forced displacement of
civilians.

Many, however, question the exclusion of Gen. Wiranto who was
then chief commander of the Indonesian Military (TNI) when the
bloody violence broke out, driving close to 250,000 people into
West Timor and burning almost 80 percent of infrastructure in the
former 27th province of Indonesia.