Legal, political aspects 'neglected' in rights cases

JAKARTA (JP): A member of the National Commission on Human Rights, Marzuki Darusman, pointed out yesterday that legal and political aspects were often neglected when reproaching human rights cases here.

"When looking at Indonesia we must differentiate between human rights abuses with legal violations, which people abroad don't do... it makes it seem like there's a perpetual violation of human rights here," said Marzuki, who is the commission's deputy chairman.

Speaking to reporters after meeting with members of the European Parliament, Marzuki said he told the visiting delegation that the "political and legal dimension" had to be differentiated when talking about alleged rights violations here.

"There have been cases where typical human rights violations occurred, but there have been other cases which were purely law violations," he said.

While maintaining that the commission strongly held the universal values of human rights, Marzuki said various incidents should not all be lumped as human rights violations.

A 12-member delegation of the European Parliament-Indonesia Friendship Association (EPIFA) is currently on a three-day visit here as guests of the House of Representatives.

"It was a constructive discussion, and the commission and EPIFA have also agreed to start up channels of communication with each other," Marzuki said.

During yesterday's meeting, the delegation queried the commission on prevalent issues, such as jailed labor leader Muchtar Pakpahan, the fate of the imprisoned members of the unrecognized Democratic People's Party (PRD) and the issue of East Timor.

Marzuki said he explained to the delegation that the Pakapahan and PRD cases were "legal cases that were still in progress".

He said Pakpahan already received the necessary legal defense and health facilities for his illness while in jail.

"So, from a humanitarian point of view, we told the EPIFA delegation that there were no immediate rights problems in the Pakpahan and PRD cases," Marzuki said.

Pakpahan is serving a four-year prison term after the Supreme Court controversially annulled its own ruling which freed Pakpahan from all charges imposed on him by a Medan court.

Pakpahan was found guilty of inciting a mass labor riot in Medan in 1994.

Over a dozen young members of PRD in Jakarta and Surabaya, East Java, were jailed last year for undermining the state ideology Pancasila.

Marzuki said the delegation raised the questions on the jailed activists in reaction to what they read in a human rights report published by Amnesty International, referring to the cases as "trials of thoughts". (aan)