Disasters aplenty but some light ahead

Disasters aplenty but some light ahead

The past one year saw various disasters hit the country, starting
with the horrific earthquake and tsunami that ravaged Aceh and
Nias island in North Sumatra and including the latest terrorist
attacks on Bali. On a brighter note, significant progress was
recorded this year in the fight against corruption with several
major suspects already convicted and sent to jail. However, the
authorities' failure to identify the masterminds behind the
murder of human rights advocate Munir added to the country's poor
human rights record.

Photo: A: Bali

Reuters/Adrees Latief

BLAST SCENE: A police officer looks at one of two bomb blast
sites marked with red flags at Bali's Jimbaran Beach. Suicide
bombers were behind three attacks on the resort island on Oct. 1
that killed 20 innocent people, police said.

Photo B: Ball

JP/ID Nugroho

LURING VOTERS: A local election committee member tries to kick a
ball into the mini goal at a polling station in Surabaya, East
Java, in a bid to entice voters to cast their ballots. The
committee offered cassava snacks for every voter who managed to
score a goal. The first ever direct local elections were held
across Indonesia starting in June in Kutai Kertanegara regency.
The polls generally passed off peacefully, with only minor
disputes sparked by contested results.

PHOTO C: Aceh

JP/Apriadi Gunawan

ACEH DESTRUCTION: Meulaboh, the capital of West Aceh regency, was
left flattened by the Dec. 26, 2004, earthquake and subsequent
tsunami that destroyed almost all of its houses, infrastructure
and public facilities. Reconstruction work has been proceeding at
a slow place in Meulaboh and other areas across tsunami-ravaged
Aceh, despite the government already receiving huge amounts of
money from donors and other countries.

PHOTO D: KPU

JP/Mulkan Salmona

SMILING NO MORE: General Elections Commission (KPU) chairman
Nazaruddin Syamsuddin is escorted by policemen into a courtroom
in Jakarta. The Anticorruption Court jailed him for seven years
and ordered him to repay Rp 5 billion (US$500,000) in public
funds that he illegally received when heading the commission,
which organized last year's general elections.

PHOTO E: Munir

JP/Mulkan Salmona

RIGHTS TRAGEDY: Activists hold up posters bearing images of noted
human rights campaigner Munir, who was murdered in September
2004, during a protest to demand his killers be brought to
justice. Earlier this month, the Central Jakarta District Court
sentenced pilot Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto to 14 years in jail
for his role in the murder case. However, the trial failed to
identify the masterminds.

PHOTO F: Aceh

JP/R. Berto Wedhatama

NO MORE GUNS: International peace monitors receive the last of
the required firearms from former insurgents in Banda Aceh, Aceh. The
event on Dec. 21 marked the end of disarmament by the Free Aceh
Movement (GAM) as required under the peace deal signed in August
in Helsinki, Finland.