Pollycarpus 'facilitated Munir murder'

Pollycarpus 'facilitated Munir murder'

Eva C. Komandjaja and Urip Hudiono, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Police investigators said on Monday that Pollycarpus Budihari
Priyanto, the only suspect so far in the murder of human rights
activist Munir, was not the main executor, but "facilitated" the
murder to happen.

Head of the investigation team at National Police headquarters
Sr. Comr. Anton Charlian explained that Pollycarpus was assigned
to make sure that Munir was aboard the aircraft and that he was
sitting in a designated seat.

He said that the Garuda pilot had contacted Munir via cell
phone before the flight and gave his business class seat to him
during the Jakarta-Singapore flight.

Munir, co-founder of human rights organizations Imparsial and
Kontras, was found dead onboard a Garuda flight from Jakarta to
Amsterdam on Sept. 7 last year.

An autopsy conducted by Dutch authorities found excessive
amounts of arsenic in his body, indicating that he was murdered
on the one-hour leg of the flight from Jakarta to Singapore.

Pollycarpus was declared a suspect on Saturday after five days
of interrogation by police.

He has denied all involvement. The Garuda pilot said that he
was assigned to the Sept. 7 flight as a security aviation officer
to check a Garuda plane in Singapore. But investigators later
discovered that his assignment letter was written more than a
week after the flight, and that it was signed by Garuda's vice
president of corporate security Ramelgia Anwar instead of the
operational director as is normally the case.

"We're pretty confident that he's involved in the (murder)
case because there are so many discrepancies we found in his
statements and through documents we've collected," Anton said.

Anton, however, acknowledged that the police had not yet found
others involved in the crime, such as the person who put the
poison into Munir's meal during the flight, and the masterminds
behind the assassination.

With his known role in the case thus far, Pollycarpus could be
charged with assisting a premeditated murder and also document
forgery.

Director of transnational security at National Police
headquarters Brig. Gen. Pranowo Dahlan said that police were
continuing to question Pollycarpus on his role in the murder.

Apart from Pollycarpus, Pranowo said police were also
questioning Rohainil Aini, secretary to Garuda's chief of pilots,
who was also indicated by the government-sanctioned fact-finding
team as a person of interest in the case.

The fact-finding team had previously indicated that at least
six persons, including Pollycarpus and Rohainil, were involved in
the conspiracy. The others were Garuda's former president
director Indra Setiawan, vice president of corporate security
Ramelgia Anwar, and two unnamed persons linked to the State
Intelligence Agency (BIN).

Separately, Pollycarpus' lawyer Suhardi Somomoeljono expressed
his annoyance at police for naming his client as a suspect
"prematurely" before examining evidence from Dutch authorities.

The evidence includes records of interviews conducted by Dutch
authorities of passengers and Garuda employees, case reports, and
several tissue samples Dutch doctors took from Munir during the
autopsy.

The Indonesian Ambassador for the Netherlands was scheduled to
meet with officials from the Dutch ministry of justice on Monday
to discuss mechanisms for turning over the evidence.

Elsewhere, newly-appointed Garuda president director Emirsyah
Satar said that the airline's management was ready to assist
authorities in their investigation into Munir's murder.