Little victims of Aceh atrocities speak up

JAKARTA (JP): Dozens of Acehnese children recounted their tales of horror during 10 years of military operations in their province on Thursday, bringing tears to the eyes of activists who are campaigning for their cause.

Members of the Voice of Concerned Mothers (SIP) and the newly- established National Commission for Children's Rights met with 17 children and six women who lost their fathers and husbands in the alleged military atrocities.

Deddy Mawardi from the Indonesian Education and Legal Aid Foundation, who brought the children and women here, said people had already started to forget the suffering of the Acehnese people.

The women and children said they still lived in fear, despite the recent lifting of Aceh's status as a military operation zone.

"I moved to Medan (in North Sumatra) to find peace because unidentified people kept stalking me and my son," said Cut Ima Kemala, whose husband Mahdi Yusuf was abducted by three soldiers on the afternoon of Feb. 2, 1991 and has been missing ever since.

"I believe my husband is dead," she told a meeting with the children's commission.

Twelve-year-old Musliadi from Balangawe village in Samtarila Bayu, North Aceh, said he still had nightmares about the murder of his father, M. Yamin, back in 1991.

"My brother and I were helping my father in our paddy field when a soldier up on the street shot my father in the leg without warning.

"My father tried to run, but he was then shot from behind. The bullet went through the back of his head and crushed my father's right eye," Musliadi said, choking.

"My mum said tough boys don't cry."

Muhammad Yusuf, a 12-year-old from Leuksukon in North Aceh, said his father, Mustafa, was taken away from the house seven years ago.

"I saw soldiers clobbering his head with a rifle ... they tied his hands together and kept on beating him. I was too scared to move.

"Then the soldiers' 'claws' ripped my dad's head and they threw his body into a jeep. Two soldiers sat in front and one in the back," Yusuf said.

"I hate soldiers. They hit my father. I wish I had a big claw to tear their heads with."

M. Yamin of the YPBHI revealed the "claws" Yusuf referred to were bayonets the soldiers allegedly used to scalp his father.

The group met with children's rights campaigners such as Seto Mulyadi, Nafsiah Mboy, Apong Herlina, Aris Merdeka Sirait, Gadis Arivia and Karlina Leksono. All promised to lend their support to the victims' fight to get compensation from the government. (edt)