Police top human rights abuse, reports Kontras

JAKARTA (JP): The Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) has recorded 1,216 cases of human rights abuse throughout the year, with police troops taking the lion's share.

Field investigations conducted by Kontras activists in several volatile areas in the country, including Irian Jaya and Aceh, revealed that 2,119 people had died over the past 12 months in incidents involving human rights violations.

Konstras coordinator Munarman told a media conference held in conjunction with the International Human Rights Day here that incidents of torture were rampant in the country with 429 cases and 878 victims.

Arbitrary arrests were placed second in the number of victims, with 710 in the 450 cases reported, while killings without prior proper legal process claimed 457 lives. There have been 50 cases of forced disappearance or abduction throughout the year, according to Kontras, with 78 people declared still missing.

Aceh was the province most afflicted by human rights abuse, according to Kontras. Since January the territory in the northern tip of Sumatra has seen 57 cases of forced disappearance with 73 victims; 185 cases of attempted murder resulting in 310 deaths; 315 cases of arbitrary arrest affecting 455 people; and 376 reports of torture with 436 victims.

Violence remains unabated in Aceh, where separatist rebels have been waging an independence struggle since the 1970s, despite the revocation of a decade-long military operations in August 1998. The latest violence which occurred in connection with the anniversary celebration of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) on Monday left 10 people dead.

Irian Jaya, at the other end of the archipelago, has also witnessed a series of violent incidents as calls for independence have intensified. At least 16 people were killed as people in the natural-resource rich province observed the unrecognized 1961 declaration of independence on Dec. 1.

Kontras noted that police contributed an additional 910 violations to the litany of human rights abuses it recorded at the end of the second millennium. Indonesian Military (TNI) was blamed in 29 cases, and the two security forces (TNI and the Police) were implicated in 175 rights abuses when holding joint operations.

In the restive province of Aceh alone, 735 human rights violations were attributed to the police.

Munarman said the police, like the military, tended to violate human rights because its function had been reduced to an institution to enforce the government's policies.

The police, Munarman said, had also been unable to change its doctrine and code of conduct in addressing security problems in the society.

Ending the conference, Munarman expressed his skepticism that human rights protection could be improved in the future due to the government's "authoritarian" stance in solving problems in Aceh, Irian and Maluku.

"The state has obviously allowed human rights abuses to be committed by its security apparatus throughout the year 2000, and allowed the use of force in addressing problems, as has happened in Aceh and Irian, " he said. (amd)