Munir probe takes aim at bank accounts

Eva C. Komandjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

A special fact-finding team said on Wednesday that the Financial Transaction and Report Analysis Center (PPATK) was ready to help examine bank accounts of suspects in the poisoning death of noted human rights activist Munir.

Team chief Brig. Gen. Marsudi Hanafi said the promise was made in a meeting on Tuesday with PPATK deputy chairman Brig. Gen. Susno Duadji.

The pledged examinations of the accounts are aimed at finding any suspicious transactions related to last September's poisoning of Munir on board a Garuda Indonesia flight.

"He (Susno) has vowed to help us check bank accounts belonging to four persons who may have been involved in the case, including former Garuda president director Indra Setiawan," Marsudi said.

The team believes that there might have been money transferred to those accounts, by the masterminds of the murder, as payment for facilitating the poisoning.

"PPATK will examine their accounts and if there are any suspicious transactions, they'll analyze them and submit a report with us," he added.

The move comes after Garuda pilot Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto was officially declared a suspect by the National Police for his alleged role in "facilitating" the murder of Munir, and forging documents linked to the case.

Munir, cofounder of human rights watchdogs Imparsial and Kontras, was found dead aboard the Garuda flight to Amsterdam on Sept. 7.

An autopsy conducted by Dutch authorities found excessive amounts of arsenic in his body, indicating that he may have been given the poison on the one-hour leg of the flight from Jakarta to Singapore.

Police were developing the investigation in order to obtain sufficient evidence to charge other Garuda executives in the high-profile case.

The fact-finding team has proposed seven names -- five Garuda officials and two National Intelligence Agency (BIN) officers -- to the police, as persons of interest.

The five Garuda officials include Pollycarpus, Indra Setiawan and secretary to Garuda's chief of pilots Rohainil Aini, who is currently being questioned by the police. The remaining two are former vice president of corporate security Ramelgia Anwar and vice president of human resources Daan Ahmad.

"We suspect that Daan is also involved in the case since he temporarily replaced Ramelgia during that time. We're now investigating his track record," Marsudi said.

The team is scheduled to meet BIN officials on Thursday to seek clarification on whether Pollycarpus was linked to BIN as widely rumored, as well as to get information on two BIN agents, who the police refuse to publicly name.

Separately, head of the police investigation team Sr. Comr. Anton Charlian said that no links were found so far between Rohainil and Munir's death.

Rohainil has been fielding questions for the past four days after police accused her of lying about Pollycarpus' assignment letter.

Investigators found that the letter was issued more than a week after the flight, and that it was signed by Ramelgia Anwar instead of the operational director, as is normally the case.

Anton said the police would summon the recently replaced Indra Setiawan and Ramelgia Anwar for similar questioning next week.