Protesters urged to stop attacking security officers

JAKARTA (JP): Jakarta Military Commander Maj. Gen. Djadja Suparman appealed on Saturday to student protesters to stop attacking security officers in order to prevent a possible rift between the Armed Forces (ABRI) and the students.

Djadja made the comments in the wake of clashes last week which included the student-military encounter under the Senayan flyover in Central Jakarta on Thursday, the alleged military attack against a bus carrying Indonesian Christian University (UKI) students near their Cawang campus in East Jakarta in the evening of the same day and the assault of an ABRI member by students the next morning.

"I'm afraid that if the students keep attacking the soldiers, there will be retaliation. I don't want that to happen.

So let's return to the existing legal rules and norms that we agreed in order to avoid dissent between us," he told a media briefing at the command headquarters on Saturday.

He also warned that any conflict between ABRI and the students could be exploited by certain parties to discredit ABRI's public image.

"I'm afraid that certain parties -- using the name of ABRI -- will do that thing (attacking the students) which would then lead the public to think ABRI is taking revenge on the students," Djadja said.

The two-star general insisted that ABRI would never take such retaliation.

"ABRI operates according to the legal norms and is involved in the reform process, including legal reform, and maintaining human rights above other things," he said.

On Friday night, about a dozen armored vehicles were on alert in front of the UKI campus on Jl. Mayjen Sutoyo in Cawang, 400 meters from Djadja's headquarters.

Troops were reportedly singing atop the vehicles and their lights were shone into the campus compound. The vehicles were pulled back at dawn on Saturday.

According to Djadja, the vehicles were deployed to secure the campus from possible attacks from other parties after the students reportedly assaulted an officer on Friday morning.

"The armored vehicles were there for security reasons and to prevent certain parties (from attacking the campus) as they were dissatisfied with the student's action, including examining passengers of public buses, abducting and assaulting ABRI members," he said.

Djadja, however, refused to name the parties he was referring to.

He said First Private Jumbadi from the Special Armored Vehicles group of the 7th Cavalry Battalion in East Jakarta was captured by UKI students in a special operation and was attacked until he fell unconscious in the campus at 7:50 a.m. on Friday.

During their operation, he said, the students stopped all public transportation from passing in front of the campus, to ensure no one found the soldier.

He said that Jumbadi, who suffered brain damage, was sent to Kramat Jati Police Hospital in East Jakarta at about 10 a.m.

"He was on his way back to his post at Patra Kuningan (South Jakarta) from his residence when the incident took place. He had received permission to return home to arrange his wedding."

Jumbadi's identity card, cash totaling Rp 400,000 and his bayonet were taken away by his captors.

"The students' action is beyond the limit of humanity. They did this thing as if they felt that they are invincible," Djadja said.

The incident was believed to have been sparked by the clash near the Cawang flyover on Thursday evening.

During that incident, unidentified soldiers reportedly fired at a Himpurna bus carrying UKI students home after staging a rally under the Senayan flyover in the afternoon.

According to the students, after puncturing the bus' tires, the soldiers then boarded the bus and beat the youths, leaving at least 22 students injured. As the students refused to get off, the soldiers left the bus and sprinted toward the Cawang flyover and disappeared.

The military claimed that the overcrowded bus was not shot at and the back tires were deflated shortly after it veered onto the sidewalk.

But the students insisted that it was the soldiers who shot at them "using rifles."

Djadja admitted on Saturday that shots were fired at the scene but only into the air as warning shots, and they were not aimed at the bus.

The soldiers, he said, fired the warning shots purely to defend themselves from being attacked by the students, who rode on two buses.

"No live ammunition was found at the scene of the incident, only rubber bullets," he said.

What happened was that the soldiers, who were heading to their nearby base in Cililitan, were chased and beaten by the students, the general said.

"It was self-defense by the security officers," Djadja said referring to the shots.

"Reports that the security officers were blocking the buses heading to UKI are totally wrong," he said.

During the briefing, Djadja also explained that soldiers who were now deployed to secure the capital, including at the House of Representatives complex, only carried batons and shields.

"Only four members in each company are allowed to carry tear gas and rifles armed with blank and rubber bullets," he said.

The decision was designed "to avoid clashes and casualties caused by live ammunition," he said.

Moreover, he said, people always blamed the security forces in any fatal shooting incident of using live bullets.

Commenting on the brutal clash between security forces and students on Friday afternoon under the Senayan flyover near the House, Djadja said the unrest occurred because the student groups already involved other general people to join their movement.

"If they were all real students, they would have used intellectual approach. But in this case, they used violence. They armed themselves and attacked the soldiers," he said.

Djadja also apologized if the security forces had used repressive measures in dealing with the student protesters.

"We apologize if security officers have acted beyond the limit of human values. We did it to secure the capital from disintegration," he said. (ivy)