Pakpahan seeks treatment abroad through rights body
Pakpahan seeks treatment abroad through rights body
JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Prosperous Labor Union has asked
the National Commission on Human Rights to help its jailed
leader, Muchtar Pakpahan, get medical treatment abroad.
Acting union leader Tohap Simanungkalit, accompanied yesterday
by nine other members of the unrecognized union, said it was not
possible to treat Pakpahan's illness here.
In its submission to the commission, the union included a
medical report from physicians stating that Pakpahan needed a
lung imagy fluorescence endoscopy -- treatment which is
unavailable in Indonesia.
"For that reason, we ask the commission to recommend the
Ministry of Justice grant him a travel permit," he said.
The treatment is available in Singapore, the United States
and Canada, the submitted report said.
Pakpahan was sentenced to three years in jail in November 1994
for inciting riots in Medan. The High Court increased the
sentence to four years.
But he was later released from jail after a three-member panel
of Supreme Court justices led by Adi Andojo Soetjipto exonerated
him from all charges after finding there was insufficient
evidence to punish Pakpahan.
Former chief justice Soerjono, with colleagues Sarwata and
Radja Palti Siregar, however, overturned Andojo's decision last
October after they found mistakes in the implementation of the
law.
As he had to serve his jail term, he was tried on subversion
charges last year for his alleged involvement in the July 27,
1996, bloody riot.
Pakpahan was admitted to Cikini Hospital in Central Jakarta in
March, four days after he yelled at a South Jakarta District
Court judge for ignoring his deteriorating health.
The union's secretary-general Sunarti told The Jakarta Post
that Pakpahan suffers from a lung tumor, a blood clot in the
brain and appendicitis.
The commission's secretary-general Baharuddin Lopa said he
would study the case and send a letter to the ministry.
Meanwhile Jakarta City Police handed over to the Bekasi
Prosecutor's Office yesterday a Catholic priest accused of
harboring three wanted Democratic People's Party (PRD) activists
last year.
City Police spokesman Lt. Col. E. Aritonang said that the
priest, Ignatius Sandyawan Sumardi, arrived at police
headquarters at 10:30 a.m. to be taken to Bekasi.
Aritonang said the duty of police was only to hand over
Sandyawan to the district court because the police had finished
the dossiers.
Sandyawan allegedly harbored PRD leaders Budiman Sudjatmiko,
Petrus H. Haryanto and Yakobus Eko Kurniawan, who had been found
guilty of subversion in April, at the Bekasi home of his brother,
Benny Sumardi.
He said if found guilty, Sandyawan would face a maximum
penalty of nine months' imprisonment. (05/cst)