Pilot 'not aware' of Pollycarpus mission

JAKARTA: A Garuda Indonesia pilot testified at the Central Jakarta District Court on Tuesday that murder-accused Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto was aboard his plane, where a human rights campaigner Munir was murdered last year.

However, Sabur Muhammad Taufik, who piloted the plane on Sept. 6, 2004, said he knew nothing about Pollycarpus' mission in Singapore.

Sabur said he saw the defendant at the Garuda flight crew center at the Soekarno-Hatta International Airport moments before the departure and after his arrival in Singapore.

"We and other crew members were inside the same bus from Changi Airport to Novotel, but I did not know the room he (Pollycarpus) was staying in," the pilot said.

Sabur said the aircraft's crew changed before it flew on to the Netherlands and he returned to Jakarta on Sept. 8.

Munir later died on the flight from Singapore to Schipol Airport in Netherlands on Sept. 7, 2004. A Dutch autopsy revealed more than 50 times the level of arsenic needed to kill him in his body.

Sabur also said he was not informed that during the Jakarta- Singapore flight, Munir was moved to the business class from economy. --JP