Bintang responds to police summons
Bintang responds to police summons
JAKARTA (JP): Legislator Sri Bintang Pamungkas entered the National Police headquarters yesterday for another round of questioning, his third in the past month, after backing out of an earlier threat to ignore the police summons.
Bintang managed to limit the police questions to legal technicalities and procedures. He refused to answer questions about allegations he slandered President Soeharto in several lecturers he gave in Germany in March and April.
Police have elevated his status from witness to a suspect. After three hours of questioning, Bintang was allowed to leave.
"Now that I'm a suspect, I have the right to remain silent," he told reporters of his attitude during the interrogation.
Throughout the investigation, the United Development Party legislator was accompanied by lawyers from the Jakarta Legal Aid Institute, Soekardjo Adidjojo, Luhut M.P. Pangaribuan and R. Dwiyanto Prihartono.
The military has named Bintang as one of a number of Indonesians who took part in a series of anti-Indonesian government demonstrations during President Soeharto's visits to several German cities last month.
He has been the only one questioned so far.
Bintang denied the accusations, although he admitted being at one demonstration as a curious bystander.
The legislator was in Germany for a series of speaking engagements around the same time Soeharto was touring the country.
Bintang told journalists after the interrogation that a large part of the time was spent debating the legal grounds for summoning him. "I would only agree to be questioned as a suspect if the police investigators could show me the President's approval for summoning me," he said.
He invoked article 3 of Law No. 13/1970 which said that police must have the approval of the President in order to question a legislator in connection with any criminal case.
Bintang was furious last week when he discovered that the only document the police had during the first two rounds of questioning was a letter of approval from Minister/State Secretary Moerdiono dated April 15, 1995.
He said the first two rounds of police questioning were invalid because they were based on approval from the minister and not the head of state.
He said the police summons, in contravention to the Criminal Code Procedures, failed to spell out the precise crime he supposedly committed, but simply cited two articles, one for assaulting the President and another for defaming him.
Bintang also threatened to sue the police yesterday for failing to observe proper procedures in handling his case.
Meanwhile, the chief spokesman for the national police, Brig. Gen. I Ketut Ratta, said on a separate occasion yesterday that the investigation was focussing on Bintang's speeches in Germany.
"Bintang refused to answer the police investigators' questions," he told reporters, adding that Bintang also declined to sign the investigation report.
Ratta said that the police have handled the case properly. (imn)