Committee puts forward names for KKR
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Forty two candidates have been named for membership of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (KKR), the main duty of which is to establish the truth behind unresolved human rights abuse cases in the country.
Wicipto Setiadi, secretary of the committee in charge of selecting the 42 candidates, said on Tuesday that his office had proposed the names to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who would select 21 commission members.
He said the 42 candidates, who were selected from a total of 1,500 applicants, had passed a series of tests including screening by the House of Representatives.
The candidates include human rights activists, academicians and retired military/police officials.
Among the activists are director of the Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (ELSAM) Ifdhal Kasim, historian Anhar Gonggong and prominent Christian figure Natan Setiabudi.
Candidates with a military/police background include Samsudin, a retired major general who is now a member of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM); former staff to presidential military secretary Vice Marshall (ret) Budhy Santoso, Col. (ret) Tatang Kartawan, Maj. Gen. (ret) Abdullah Cholil, and Col. (ret) Parlindungan Sinaga, a former police official.
Samsudin once served in Papua, while both Budhy and Parlindungan have served in the former province of East Timor. Abdullah was a physician with the Army.
The KKR was supposed to be operational by April of this year, according to Law No. 27/2004 on the commission.
The law authorizes the KKR to investigate past gross human rights violations, and then make recommendations to the President on how to resolve the cases, which have left uncertainties in Indonesian history.
Rights activists have not pinned their hopes on the establishment of the KKR, however, as most human rights violations occurred in the past, involving top government and military officials, some of whom remain in power or are politically well-connected.
For the seven years of its mandate, including a two-year possible extension, the KKR is expected to resolve cases of human rights violations that occurred before the year 2000, the year the human rights tribunal was established.
The cases include the bloody 1998 May riots, the killings of students during demonstrations in 1999, as well as the events of 1965, when many people were accused of being members or of being linked to the outlawed Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and were sent to prison without trial following a failed coup attempt allegedly carried out by the PKI.