Priok victims refuse to give up

M. Taufiqurrahman, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta

Dismayed by the acquittal of Army's special forces commander Maj. Gen. Sriyanto Muntrasan, victims and the family members of victims of the 1984 shooting incident in Tanjung Priok demanded on Friday an international rights tribunal for the military officers involved.

The victims, facilitated by the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras), said they would resort to an international tribunal if the Supreme Court upholds the ad hoc human rights court verdict that has released, so far, all but one officer implicated in the massacre.

The Attorney General's Office is considering an appeal.

"Although we don't believe prosecutors will be successful in their appeal, we are relying on the Supreme Court in any case. If the appeal is overturned, we will bring the human rights case to the international forum," one of the victims, Abdul Basyir told The Jakarta Post.

Basyir, along with seven people in his family, were detained at a military detention center in Cimanggis, Bogor regency, without trial, in the wake of the shooting incident.

Yetty Bachtiar, a daughter of Tanjung Priok victim Bachtiar Johan, assured that with palpable international pressure, she believed the TNI generals implicated in the atrocities could be brought to justice.

When asked how she felt about the not-guilty verdict, Yetty said: "It doesn't make any sense that those who ordered the shooting in Tanjung Priok were acquitted. We are infuriated by the verdict and feel very sad," she told the Post.

Official figures say that 24 people were killed and 54 others injured. However, the testimonies of victims and family members of victims indicated that over 100 people were killed in the incident, one of the bloodiest in the 30-year rule of former president Soeharto.

On Thursday, Sriyanto, the operations chief of the North Jakarta Military Command at the time of the incident, was freed of charges of gross human rights violations.

The verdict contradicted an earlier decision delivered by the same court, which convicted former North Jakarta Military commander Maj. Gen. (ret) Rudolph Butar Butar and sentenced him to 10 years in prison for crimes against humanity in Tanjung Priok.

Coordinator of Kontras Usman Hamid said the demand for an international tribunal was logical, considering the country's weak judiciary.

Kontras and fellow non-governmental organizations the Foundation for Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI), the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), the Indonesian Human Rights Watch (Imparsial) and the Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (Elsam), denounced on Friday the acquittal of Sriyanto, saying it dealt the struggle to uphold human rights in the country a huge blow.

"The ad hoc rights tribunal is merely part of the cycle of impunity for perpetrators of crimes against humanity," the NGOs said in their joint statement.

Former Udayana Military commander Maj. Gen. Adam Damiri was the latest military or police officer exonerated in the human rights tribunal over the 1999 mayhem in East Timor, when the Supreme Court overturned the ad hoc court verdict that sentenced him to three years in prison last week.