Planned antiterror amendments slammed

Planned antiterror amendments slammed

Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta

The government's intention of introducing draconian legislation
to fight terrorism appears likely to face a long hard slog after
politicians and human rights campaigners roundly criticized the
proposal.

Golkar legislator Yuddy Chrisnandy warned the government
against introducing legislation that could threaten human rights,
particularly given the high number of dubious arrests and alleged
mistreatment of suspects by the police in their investigations of
terrorist attacks over the past few years.

Law enforcement agencies have also been criticized for making
no efforts to restore the good names of those later released due
to the lack evidence.

"We, the members of Commission I on political, defense and
foreign affairs, recently approved the United Nations Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights. We want all legislation in this
country to comply with the principles contained in the Covenant,"
Yuddy said.

He was commenting on the government's proposal to beef up the
Antiterrorism Law in the wake of the recent bomb blasts in Bali.

"Once the government submits the draft amendments to the
Antiterrorism Law, we will carefully examine them to ensure that
their provisions do not contravene the Covenant," Yuddy said.

News of the planned amendments was disclosed by Ansja'ad Mbai,
who heads the antiterror desk at the Office of the Coordinating
Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs. He
acknowledged that the draft amendments could "compromise
individual human rights so as to ensure the safety of the public
at large."

Ansja'ad said that many countries had adopted similar tough
legislation following the terrorist attacks on the United States
on Sept. 11. 2001.

In Australia, the local antiterrorism legislation gives power
to the attorney general to ban certain groups from pursuing their
activities, and to abrogate certain rights of such groups'
members while being questioned by security officers.

In the wake of the legislation, the Australian authorities
asked the Indonesian government to ban Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) --
the Asian terrorist network believed to have been responsible for
the series of terror attacks in Indonesian beginning in 2000.

Tough legislation has also been introduced in many other
Western countries allowing the state to curtail individual
freedoms in the light of the terrorist threat.

Noted rights activist Asmara Nababan had earlier urged
lawmakers not to endorse the government's move to amend the
Antiterrorism Law, arguing that the lack of a legal umbrella for
investigators was not the main reason behind the country's
inability to curb terrorism.

"The problem lies in a lack coordination between all of the
intelligence services in this country as well as the poor showing
of the police in dealing with extraordinary crimes.

"Therefore, we do not need a draconian law for this country,"
said Asmara, who is also a former secretary-general of the
National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM).