Open doors to E. Timor inquiry

Open doors to E. Timor inquiry

By Edward Cowan

WASHINGTON (JP): Indonesia's inquiry into what happened in
East Timor in 1999 is commendable. The Indonesian people need to
know how murder and arson and looting and kidnapping happened,
and who was responsible.

More precisely, the people and the rest of the world want to
know whether there is any merit to the claim of the military that
they were not responsible for what the Timorese militias did --
either by acts of commission or by omission.

But the way the Commission on Human Rights Abuses in East
Timor (KPP HAM) is going about the investigation is
unsatisfactory. The commission is conducting its inquiry behind
closed doors. Doing that has several unfortunate consequences.

First, it denies to the public the verbatim testimony of the
witnesses. Instead, the public reads what the witnesses told
journalists when they emerged from the inquiry.

In some cases, these statements are highly conclusionary, but
not illuminating. For example, in an Associated Press story that
appeared in The New York Times on Dec. 25, 1999, Gen. Wiranto was
reported as stating blanket denials to reporters, but there was
no explanation as to why TNI (Indonesian Military) forces did not
keep order.

Similar stories appear in The Jakarta Post and other
newspapers day by day, as the inquiry unfolds. They always report
what witnesses said "after" testifying. But they don't report
the testimony itself -- which may or may not be substantially the
same -- because reporters have not been allowed to hear the
testimony. (Whether television cameras should be allowed to tape
it or broadcast it live is a related but separate question. In
principle, they should not be wholly excluded.)

Gen. Wiranto and any witness is entitled to utter blanket
denials to the press. He can do that without a tribunal. But what
did the general tell the tribunal? What did it learn? Did he say
precisely what he said afterwards to reporters? Or was his
testimony more qualified? How did Gen. Wiranto answer the
circumstantial, detailed questions about specific events that one
hopes the tribunal's members asked? In fact, did they ask such
questions?

That raises a second unsatisfactory result of not letting the
press and the public attend the inquiry. The public doesn't know
whether the tribunal asked detailed questions, whether it asked
follow-up questions or whether it alertly challenged
inconsistencies between the testimonies of different witnesses.

Consequently, it is difficult to judge whether the inquiry is
being conducted competently -- that is to say, with aggressive
thoroughness and with adequate preparation by tribunal members.
Do they listen passively? Or do they question searchingly?

President Abdurrahman Wahid and many other Indonesians have
been resisting cries from abroad for an international
investigative body to look into the events of East Timor. That
proposal can be rejected more persuasively if Indonesia's
internal inquiry is seen to be thorough, competent and
purposeful.

When the inquiry is conducted behind closed doors, outsiders
have no basis for such a finding. So far, there is no way to
conclude that the inquiry merits public confidence.

Indeed, the tribunal has raised a doubt about its own
objectivity by publishing an interim finding, before hearing
testimony. It voiced a presumption that TNI generals, including
Wiranto, should be held responsible for failing to prevent the
violence from occurring, and failing to stop it.

That is a reasonable view, one held by people in Indonesia and
elsewhere who wondered why an army that had occupied the 27th
province for 24 years could not keep order. But for the
commission of inquiry to indulge itself in expressing that view
before it had heard all interested parties, and especially those
suspected of malfeasance, was a tactical error. It opened the
tribunal to the charge that it had made up its mind before
hearing all the evidence.

Those who favor taking testimony behind closed doors will
argue that the public should not be exposed to unsubstantiated
accusations and rumors, if only to protect the reputations of
those falsely accused.

Depending on who utters it, that may be a decent sensibility
-- if it is not a pretext for a cover-up. As decent as it may be,
however, it is not one that should prevail, as a rule.

If democratic government has one transcendent quality, it is
openness.

Democracy's slogan is "Trust the people." Give the people the
facts and let them decide. That is the basis of free elections.
If there is conflict between testimonies, let the conflicting
assertions be heard, compared and evaluated. Let the public hear
the tone of voice, see the body language and facial expression
and reach its own conclusions about where the truth lies.

Different people may reach different conclusions. It is not
always a tidy process, and sometimes untruthful declarations
capture the field, usually only briefly.

How the Timor inquiry is conducted is not an isolated
question. It may bear on the inquiry that is coming about events
in Aceh, where similar issues will be explored. It is to be hoped
that in Aceh the doors of the inquiring body will be open, the
witnesses will be required to give sworn testimony subject to the
penalties of perjury and the facts -- including conflicting
statements -- will be available to press and public.

The writer, a retired New York Times correspondent, spent
three months in Indonesia in 1999 as a Knight International Press
Fellow.