Crowd blamed for chruch attack
Crowd blamed for chruch attack
Zakki Hakim, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
A military officer testified before a human rights tribunal on
Tuesday that a gunshot from inside the Liquica church compound
triggered a riot in Liquica, East Timor, in April 1999.
Testifying at the trial of Maj. Gen. Adam Damiri, Capt. Djoko
Waluyo, a former Liquica military district command (Kodim) staff
member, said that the crowd surrounding the church complex
clashed with those inside the complex after a gunshot from inside
were heard.
"About five minutes after the shot, we got orders to enter the
complex and rescue Father Rafael dos Santos. We went in and
escorted him out along with eight others," Waluyo said.
He said he and his team were not armed and saw no bodies or
blood in the process.
Father dos Santos, an East Timorese priest, testified before
the same court last Thursday that the shot was heard from outside
the complex. He also said he saw from his house in the complex
that among the attackers were Kodim personnel in civilian attire
carrying M-16 rifles.
When he was being taken to safety by the Indonesian soldiers,
he saw two bodies on the way and found traces of blood everywhere
after he returned home.
Waluyo said that there was no way that military personnel
could carry M-16s because three months earlier there were orders
that the soldiers disarm themselves to prevent fatal clashes.
Furthermore he claimed M-16 rifles were not available there.
The court gave the lawyers and prosecutors one opportunity
each to bring more witnesses before the trial of Damiri, who is
being charged with crimes against humanity for failing to prevent
bloodshed. If found guilty, he faces a minimum sentence of 10
years.
Damiri is the former head of the Udayana Military Command
overseeing Bali, West Nusa Tenggara, East Nusa Tenggara and East
Timor. He is the highest ranking soldier brought before the
rights tribunal for the violence that happening during and after
the United Nations-sponsored referendum in East Timor in 1999.
The court adjourned until Feb. 4.
The trial for former East Timor military commander Brig. Gen.
Tono Suratman was scheduled to proceed on Wednesday, when
testimony of former Indonesian Army (TNI) commander Gen. (ret)
Wiranto will be heard.