Ex-BIN official resists fact-finding team's summons

Ridwan M. Sijabat and Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Despite requests from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, the former secretary of the National Intelligence Agency (BIN) Nurhadi Djazuli said on Wednesday that he would not comply with a summons from the government-sanctioned fact-finding team that is tasked to investigate the poisoning death of human rights campaigner Munir Said Thalib.

"Regardless of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's political commitment to a thorough investigation into the case, the fact- finding team has no authority to question Pak Nurhadi because according to Presidential Decree No. 111/2004, its main tasks are to help the police examine the case freely, accurately and completely and not to conduct its own investigation," Nurhadi's lawyer Sudjono told a media conference that was also attended by the former high-ranking BIN official.

Nurhadi remained silent through most of the media conference.

He was BIN secretary when Munir died aboard a Garuda flight from Jakarta to the Netherlands on Sept. 7, 2004.

Dutch authorities found excessive amounts of arsenic in his body. Susilo signed a decree for the establishment of the fact- finding team (TPF) in order to assist police probe the case.

Sudjono was responding to the fact-finding team who have already summoned his client twice to clarify the possible involvement of BIN in the case. The team turned its attention to BIN after questioning Garuda employees.

Police are focusing their investigation into Garuda executives and employees, and have named pilot Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto, stewardess Yeti Susmiyarti and flight attendant Oedi Irianto as suspects. Pollycarpus was a Garuda aviation security official who offered Munir a seat in business class, moving him from economy class, during the flight from Jakarta to Singapore.

BIN has demanded that the fact-finding team carry out its questioning at its office in Pasar Minggu, South Jakarta, and that written questions be submitted in advance.

The President has ordered all sides, including BIN, to cooperate with the fact-finding team, whose tenure will end in June.

Sudjono accused the team of committing character assassination in publishing his client's identity, even though his status in the case remains unclear.

"TPF is breaching presumption of innocence because our client's identity has not been kept anonymous until he is found guilty (by a court)," he said.

Recently appointed the Indonesian ambassador to Nigeria, Nurhadi has denied allegations that he played a role in "assigning" Pollycarpus to the flight on the day of Munir's death.

"No. Absolutely not. Many have misused my name and faked my signature to do wrong things during my tenure (in BIN)," he said.

Responding to Nurhadi's refusal to face a questioning, fact- finding team member Usman Hamid asked BIN not to act defensively, "unless some of its members were involved in the murder".

"The team and BIN are now in the process of defining the protocol of the investigation, therefore, we ask BIN officials to respect the ongoing process. Especially in the case of Nurhadi, the team wants him to respect the processes as well," said Usman, who is also the coordinator of the National Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras), which Munir founded.