Munir probe team tries to open lid on BIN

Munir probe team tries to open lid on BIN

Tiarma Siboro and Eva C. Komandjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government-sanctioned fact-finding team probing the murder of
noted human rights campaigner Munir signed a protocol on Monday
with the State Intelligence Agency (BIN) in a bid to enable
investigations into BIN agents who stand accused of involvement
in the matter.

Team member Usman Hamid, however, declined to disclose the
protocol's contents, but said it would significantly assist his
team in summoning BIN officers for questioning.

"It is hoped that the protocol will bring down the barriers,"
he said at the team's secretariat office on Jl. Latuharhari in
Central Jakarta.

The team has repeatedly complained about a lack of cooperation
on the part of BIN into the investigation of last year's
assassination of Munir.

On Monday, the team was scheduled to interrogate former BIN
secretary Nurhadi Jazuli, who was recently appointed as the new
Indonesian ambassador to Nigeria.

However, he failed to attend the session for reasons that were
unclear, Usman said.

"We planned to question Nurhadi today but he called us and
postponed the meeting, and changed the venue from our office to
BIN headquarters," said team chief Marsudi Hanafi, a police
brigadier general.

"He's not being cooperative," he added.

The signing of the protocol came after BIN chief Syamsir
Siregar assigned three BIN deputies to specifically assist the
fact-finding team.

Earlier, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had ordered all
relevant agencies to cooperate with the team and the National
Police in order to find Munir's killers.

Munir was found dead aboard a Garuda Indonesia flight from
Jakarta to Amsterdam on Sept. 7, 2004. An autopsy by Dutch
authorities found an excessive amount of arsenic in his body.

Three Garuda crew members -- pilot Pollycarpus Budihari
Priyanto and flight attendants Oedi Iriyanto and Yeti Susmiyarti
-- have been named by the police as suspects in the case.

Police investigators on Monday questioned four other Garuda
employees.

The four -- Garuda pilot in command of the GA-974 flight,
Capt. Sabur Taufik, chief steward Brahmani Astawati, Eva Yulianti
and Tri Wiryasmadi, both crew members working in economy class,
arrived at National Police headquarter at 10 a.m., accompanied by
their lawyer Wirawan Adnan.

"These crew members were summoned as witnesses because they
probably knew what was happening on the flight at that time,"
Wirawan said.

He said that Brahmani and Eva may have information on what
Munir and Pollycarpus were doing while they were aboard the
plane, adding that Brahmani was the one who gave permission for
Pollycarpus to exchange seats with Munir during the first leg of
the flight from Jakarta to Singapore.

Pollycarpus, an alleged BIN agent, was charged with
"facilitating" the murder of Munir, as he called up Munir
beforehand to check if the rights activist would be on the
flight, and offered him his seat in business class.

Earlier, Garuda vice president of corporate security Ramelgia
Anwar denied he ever issued Pollycarpus an assignment letter to
fly to Singapore on Sept. 6, claiming it was the his own decision
to take the GA-974 flight at that time.

In response, Pollycarpus' lawyer Suhardi Somomoeljono said his
client was merely doing his duty to his superiors and he was
wondering why he was being singled out.

"He (Pollycarpus) feels like he has been abandoned to take all
the blame. No Garuda officials pay any attention to him now, and
they have not even supplied him with a lawyer, even though he is
still a Garuda employee," Suhardi said.