Maluku police want convicted separatists detained

Maluku police want convicted separatists detained

Aziz Tunny, The Jakarta Post, Ambon, Maluku

Police in the war-torn province of Maluku have called for the
arrest of two separatist leaders, who remain free despite having
been sentenced to three years in jail last week, in order to
maintain peace in their homeland.

Maluku Police chief Brig. Gen. Bambang Sutrisno said he feared
that Alex Manuputty, 55, and Semmy Waeleruny, 45, leaders of the
separatist Maluku Sovereignty Front (FKM), could stir renewed
attacks here if they were not ordered to serve their jail terms
immediately.

Last Tuesday, the North Jakarta District Court sentenced the
two, both Christians, in absentia to three years in prison for
plotting a rebellion on the Maluku Islands.

They were found guilty of carrying "an act of subversion aimed
at dividing the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia".

The court did not issue an arrest warrant for the defendants,
who returned home to the Maluku provincial capital of Ambon on
Jan. 7, after their detention period expired on Dec. 27 and
before the court could issue a verdict.

Two days later, a separate court in Jakarta acquitted Ja'far
Umar Thalib, leader of the self-dissolved Laskar Jihad Islamic
militant group, of all charges of provoking renewed violence in
Maluku, of spreading hatred against the government and of
defaming President Megawati Soekarnoputri.

Bambang said the police were awaiting instructions from legal
authorities to detain Alex and Semmy and send them to prison to
maintain security in Maluku, which has continued to improve since
the signing of a truce in 2001.

"We have no authority to arrest Alex Manuputty and Semmy
Waeleruny, since we have no arrest warrant from the court," he
told journalists in Ambon on Friday.

Bambang said local security forces had been monitoring the
activities of the convicted separatist leaders in Ambon.

Separately on Friday, head of the Maluku Prosecutor's Office
A. Badrani Rasyid expressed similar disappointment over the
absence of a court order to send Alex and Semmy directly to
prison.

Prosecutors, who had sought five-year sentences for the two on
trial since June for campaigning for independence in Maluku,
could not arrest them without a warrant from the court, Badrani
said.

The two convicted separatists remain free as both appealed the
verdict to a higher court.

Alex and Semmy were arrested in Ambon on April 17 after
encouraging their followers in the small and poorly supported FKM
to raise separatist flags, which were banned by the central
government.

The group wants Jakarta to allow a referendum on self-
determination akin to the 1999 UN-monitored ballot held in East
Timor.