Government to install 60 judges for rights court

Government to install 60 judges for rights court

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government will soon install 60 career and non-career
judges to permanent and ad hoc courts scheduled to try human
rights cases.

Minister of Justice and Human Rights Yusril Ihza Mahendra said
on Monday that the new judges would commence work after attending
a six-day course on rights issues.

After opening the course, Yusril said that he hoped to install
the judges by Dec. 1 at the latest.

The judges, half of whom are non-career appointments, will be
posted at permanent rights courts in Jakarta, Surabaya, the North
Sumatran capital of Medan and the South Sulawesi capital of
Makassar.

The government also established ad hoc rights tribunals to try
past cases, including the 1984 massacre in Tanjung Priok, North
Jakarta, and the 1999 turmoil in East Timor.

The non-career judges are comprised of experts from human
rights study centers at major state universities.

Indonesia is yet to formulate trial procedure codes for the
rights tribunal and courts, while none of the career judges have
had experience trying rights cases as Law No. 39/1999 on the
Human Rights Tribunal was only enacted in November last year.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Bagir Manan once said that
Indonesia lacked judges. He said that the country had only 2,300
judges while, ideally, there should be 5,000.

Yusril said a selection team from his ministry and the Supreme
Court, led by Supreme Court Justice Benyamin Mangkoedilaga, would
evaluate the judges' sensitivity on the issues.

"The best candidates will be entrusted with high priority
cases," he said, adding that the judges should focus only on
rights cases.

Benyamin said that only several of the recruited career judges
were assigned to specialize on rights issues, while others still
had to handle criminal or civil cases at the general courts due
to the backlog of cases.

Yusril said that the government is also ready to submit a
draft on the establishment of a commission on reconciliation and
rehabilitation to the lawmakers.

The commission, he said, would resolve past cases of human
rights violations where witnesses and evidence may no longer be
available, but the impact of which was significant to the nation.

Separately, the Supreme Court, the Indonesian Center for
Environmental Law (ICEL), the Australian Center for Environmental
Law (ACEL), the state's Environmental Impact Control Agency
(Bapedal) and SAGRIC International held the last round of
training for judges on environmental issues here.

The training, conducted since Dec. 1999 in 20 cities
throughout the country, has reached at least 600 judges, 60 state
prosecutors, 60 policemen, 96 Bapedal staffers and environmental
activists.

"Hopefully this training can boost efforts to strengthen and
uphold environmental laws in Indonesia," ICEL's executive
director Wiwiek Awiati said.