East Timor inquiry has no legal basis: Lawyers

East Timor inquiry has no legal basis: Lawyers

JAKARTA (JP): Attorney General Marzuki Darusman brushed aside
complaints from lawyers of 22 individuals allegedly responsible
for the violence in East Timor last year, saying that they were
only being questioned and not handed over to the UN Transitional
Administration in East Timor (UNTAET).

"They are taking it all wrong. It's not that we're
surrendering them to UNTAET," Marzuki told The Jakarta Post on
Thursday evening.

"Even if the questioning (eventually) finds them to be
suspects, they will be tried in Indonesia in our own court," he
said.

Marzuki said lawyers had filed a complaint against his office
with House of Representatives Commission II for legal affairs,
questioning the legality of a Memorandum of Understanding with
UNTAET as the grounds for the UN investigation to invoke their
right to query the 22.

"The memorandum was signed by Minister of Foreign Affairs Alwi
Shihab and witnessed by President Abdurrahman Wahid in February.
There's nothing illegal in it.

"I will explain this matter to the military and police chief
to avoid any misunderstandings about the position of the
witnesses," he said.

Separately, one of the lawyers in question, Mohamad Assegaf,
questioned "the legal grounds that give the right to UNTAET to
query Indonesian citizens as witnesses in the case".

"If the questioning was based on the Memorandum of
Understanding, then Attorney General Marzuki Darusman should not
have made a cooperation that binds Indonesia without the House's
acknowledgement," Assegaf told the Post.

He contended that the House must be involved in the making of
any bilateral agreements which binds the country.

"A memorandum is not enough. It should be ratified by the
House to make it legal," he said.

Assegaf added that lawyers had yet to receive the summons sent
by the Attorney General's Office, since the notification for the
military and police officers were addressed to the forces' chiefs
respectively while the summons for civil officials were sent to
the Ministry of Home Affairs.

The 22 are to be questioned by a seven-member UN investigation
team in connection with the violence that erupted in the former
Indonesian province shortly after last year's historic ballot.

Some of the witnesses to be questioned are also suspects in
the Attorney General's Office probe in a parallel investigation.

In a bid to facilitate an exchange of information, the
Attorney General's Office and UNTAET signed the memorandum in
February which would give them mutual access to information
relating to the case.

The head of the UN investigation, Olvind Olsen, said his team
had "a list of 150 suspects and witnesses".

"We came here to question witnesses in Indonesia with the help
of the Attorney General's Office. We have expressed hope that
those witnesses can give their testimonies before the trial,
which is to be held in the East Timor capital of Dili next year,"
he told a media briefing on Thursday. (bby)