I'm not responsible for Tanjung Priok shootings, says Try

JAKARTA (JP): Former vice president Gen. (ret) Try Sutrisno repeated his protestations of innocence on Monday, denying any responsibility for the 1984 Tanjung Priok shootings.

"The incident occurred by accident. The troops had no intention of killing or injuring people," Try, whose name was reportedly included in the National Commission on Human Rights' list of 23 suspects in the incident, told journalists on the sidelines of the opening ceremony of the Justice and Unity Party (PKP) congress at the Indonesia in Miniature Park in East Jakarta.

Try, who was the Jakarta Military Commander when the incident happened, said that the security forces had failed to handle the angry mob, which turned violent and uncontrollable instead.

"The troops could not avoid the clash as they were being attacked by the angry mob," Try, who is also chairman of the Association of Retired Military Officers (Pepabri), said.

He argued that the troops had reacted in accordance with the correct procedures.

He said he would be ready to be questioned as a suspect in the incident only if the Attorney General's Office had proper investigative systems and procedures for categorizing someone as a suspect.

The 1984 violence erupted following allegedly provocative sermons at Tanjung Priok's Rawa Badak Mosque by preachers who criticized the government.

Chairman of the rights commission Djoko Sugianto submitted the commission's final report on the case to Attorney General Marzuki Darusman last weekend.

The report, drawn up by a special investigation team established by the rights commission earlier this year, recommended that 23 people be listed as suspects in the 1984 incident.

Both Djoko and Marzuki have declined to name the suspects.

But a staffer with the rights commission said that all 23 of the suspects were from the military, with their ranks ranging from private up to general. They reportedly include Try and former Armed Forces (ABRI) chief Gen. (ret) L.B. Moerdani.

To date, no exact figures have been made public on the number of fatalities during the incident.

The military claimed that 40 people died in the incident, while eyewitnesses said they had seen a truck loaded with charred bodies. Meanwhile, the rights commission was able to identify 33 fatalities and 55 others as being injured in the incident.

The commission also discovered that the Army's Gatot Subroto Hospital had destroyed the medical records of 23 victims, who had been receiving treatment at the hospital.

Try denied allegations that the troops had been instructed to quell any efforts to replace Pancasila with another ideology.

"It was a local incident. Don't generalize and politicize the incident," he said with emotion.

Rumors were rife that the incident occurred because the troops were acting upon an instruction from former President Soeharto that the country's only ideology was Pancasila.

Separately, Minister of Defense Mahfud M.D. said he supported the move of the Attorney General's Office to follow up on the rights' commission's findings.

"We support the measures taken by the Attorney General's Office.

"But, the Attorney General's Office should differentiate between whether the suspects had acted beyond their authority or were merely performing their duties as members of the state apparatus," he said. (02)