RI 'not serious in dealing with rights abuses'

RI 'not serious in dealing with rights abuses'

Agence France-Presse, New York

The Indonesian government failed to address human rights
violations last year and the situation in the separatist province
of Aceh worsened sharply, Human Rights Watch said.

"The government made no serious efforts to address past or
current abuses, new human rights legislation notwithstanding,"
the New York-based group said in its annual report released on
Wednesday.

The report said the number of political prisoners rose
steadily during 2001, with many peaceful political activists
charged with "spreading hatred toward the government."

"The justice system remained a shambles," it added.

Human Rights Watch described 2001 in Indonesia as "another
turbulent year, marked by a power struggle in Jakarta and an
escalation in regional conflicts."

It criticized President Megawati Sukarnoputri's appointment of
Muhammad Abdurachman as the attorney general, calling him "a
career prosecutor known for obstructing human rights cases,
particularly with regard to East Timor."

"With no interest in prosecutions on the part of the
president, the attorney general, or the minister of justice, let
alone the military, prospects for accountability looked bleaker
than ever," it said.

Indonesia has this month set up a special tribunal for senior
military officers accused of human rights abuses in East Timor in
1999. The first trial may start next month.

The report said the situation in Aceh province, scene of a
bloody separatist insurgency, deteriorated sharply last year.

"The 2001 death toll had topped 1,300 by September, and while
most of the deaths were civilians killed in the course of
military operations, the rebel Free Aceh Movement (GAM) was also
responsible for serious abuses."

GAM has fought a guerrilla war for an independence Islamic
state in Aceh, a resource-rich region on the northern tip of
Sumatra island, since 1976.

An estimated 10,000 people have died since the start of the
insurgency. At least 97 have already been killed this year.

"Defending human rights remained a dangerous occupation,
particularly in Aceh, where at least seven rights workers were
killed," the group said.

In December 2000, four workers for an organization called
Rehabilitation Action for Torture Victims of Aceh or RATA were
abducted outside Lhokseumawe, North Aceh, by a group of armed
soldiers and civilians. Two men and a woman were executed; a
fourth escaped and gave testimony identifying several of the
killers.

On March 29, a human rights lawyer, Suprin Sulaiman, together
with his client, Teungku Kamal, and a driver, Amiruddin, were
shot dead shortly after leaving the South Aceh district police
station where Kamal had been summoned as a suspect in criminal
defamation of the police.

Four military men and four civilians were arrested. The
civilians later escaped while the soldiers reportedly remained in
the military police detention center in Medan as of October.