Police question TV, radio directors

JAKARTA (JP): Police questioned three news directors from two private television stations and a radio station on Tuesday as part of the investigation into the recording of a telephone conversation believed to be between President B.J. Habibie and Attorney General A.M. Ghalib.

The three, who were summoned as witnesses to the Kebayoran Baru police headquarters in South Jakarta, were Chrys Kelana of RCTI, Azkarmin Zaini of ANteve and Susan Masmir of Sonora.

Police also summoned a representative of SCTV, but he did not arrive.

Meanwhile, Habibie reiterated on Tuesday that the tapping of a private telephone conversation explicitly constituted a criminal act and was also a violation of human rights.

"That is a crime... intellectual crime. How can we improve democratization and reform if such an act is tolerated," he said at the State Palace in a reception for North Sulawesi community leaders.

"It seems to be a trivial case, but if it is tolerated, that is the beginning of the end," he said, saying that only Armed Forces (ABRI) detectives with consent from the ABRI commander were permitted to monitor telephone communications for national security reasons.

Minister of Defense and Security/ABRI Commander Gen. Wiranto said on Tuesday the ABRI leadership had never given any instructions to tap the President's telephone communications.

"There have been no orders from the ABRI leadership, including me, to tap the telephone conversations of the President," he said.

He admitted that it was the responsibility of presidential security guards to safeguard the President's security, his activities and all facilities in the presidential office. However, it was quite difficult to protect telephones from being tapped, he said.

Both Chrys Kelana of RCTI and Azkarmin of ANteve said after the police interrogation on Tuesday that the questions focused on how their stations came to be in possession of the cassettes containing the conversation believed to be between Habibie and Ghalib, and also on considerations for its dissemination.

"But I think journalists have the right not to disclose their source to the police except in court. I'll only reveal it in the courtroom," Chrys told reporters after the two-hour questioning.

Azkarmin also stressed that the public had the right to know what was happening behind the government's slow investigation into former president Soeharto's illegal wealth.

ANteve aired the whole conversation to prevent any misinterpretation by the public, Azkarmin said,

"If we picked only a small part of the conversation, we feared the interpretation may have been negative," he said.

However, Susan said she had no idea why police summoned her as her radio station did not broadcast any part of the recorded conversation.

"I'm here because I want to ask police why they summoned us," Susan, who was accompanied by her lawyer, Budi Carolus, said.

She said she was given 15 questions, mostly about the source of the cassettes.

"I just answered 'I don't know' because the truth was Sonora didn't know anything (about the issue being investigated)," she said.

Police said they were focusing their probe into a possible violation of Articles 14 and 15 of Law No. 1/1946 on the dissemination of false information or news which stirs public unrest. If convicted, the charge carries a maximum two year prison term.

Separately, National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. Togar M. Sianipar said the questioning of the television and radio news directors was expected to establish greater cooperation between the police and public to conclude the tapping incident.

"We hope that they (the witnesses) will cooperate with our police detectives to unravel the case as soon as possible," he said.

He said police would first try to locate the source of the cassettes in the hope that this will lead to the suspects.

Habibie did not deny having the conversation, but ordered an immediate investigation. Ghalib, however, denied the conversation ever took place.

When asked about the authenticity of the recorded voices, Togar declined to answer, but said the investigation was still underway.

Although the authenticity of the recordings has not been officially confirmed, a source close to Habibie said on Monday the President had confirmed the recorded voice was his. (emf/rms)