Parents urge police help free kidnapped son

Multa Fidrus, The Jakarta Post, Tangerang

Parents of a kidnapped boy are calling on Jakarta Police to deploy more officers to help find their eight-year-old son, who was abducted last Wednesday.

"It's already the eighth day and we have no news about our son at all. I think the city police should have assigned more detectives to search for the alleged kidnappers," the boy's father said.

The boy was in poor health when he was abducted. The kidnappers had called the mother, asking what medicine he had been prescribed to ease his fever.

The father said that his family had coordinated with Tangerang Police and Serpong Police subprecinct but there had been no results.

Tangerang Police deputy chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Tavip Yulianto said that the boy's safety was their major concern.

However, he admitted that the police are facing difficulties in solving the case because telecommunications company PT Telkom and the bank, who know the identity of the recipient of the ransom money, have refused to give information to the police.

He complained that although a new law on banking grants police the authority to ask a bank to close the account of someone allegedly involved in crime, the bank was not cooperating with the police investigation.

The kidnappers demanded a ransom of Rp 4 billion (US$470,588) from the parents. Part of the ransom, Rp 20 million, was transferred to an account in BCA on Monday but it was still at the account on Tuesday afternoon.

The father of the boy has not allowed police to look into his company's affairs.

"It's not merely a kidnapping case. We have to see it from other points of view. Kidnapping is definitely against the law. Whoever did it, was someone known to the family," Tavip said.

The boy, whose identity has been kept secret for his own safety, was abducted last Wednesday at his school in Serpong, Tangerang, by two men using a blue Toyota Kijang van with license plate B 7095 NN.