Riots investigation team will meet Officers Honor Council

JAKARTA (JP): The government-sponsored team investigating the May riots is to meet the military Officers Honor Council (DKP) to confirm its belief there were links between the unrest and the abductions of political activists and the shooting dead of four Trisakti University students.

The team's chairman, leading human rights campaigner Marzuki Darusman, said on Thursday that during the meeting with Minister of Defense and Security/Armed Forces (ABRI) Commander Gen. Wiranto on Monday, the team was given the "go ahead" to meet the council.

"It is our perspective that the riots are linked to some previous conditions.

"These conditions were shaped by the shooting at Trisakti, but were also affected by a series of violent acts against activists and students and abductions of them," Marzuki told reporters after meeting House of Representatives Commission I for defense and security, foreign affairs, information and politics.

Marzuki, however, said the meeting would involve the team's subcommittee on testimony led by rights campaigner Bambang W. Soeharto, at a "later date".

When pressed further whether the plan to meet the council was related to the speculation that former Army's Special Force (Kopassus) chief Lt. Gen. (ret) Prabowo Subianto was behind the riots, Marzuki said the meeting might "shed light on the overall pattern".

He spoke of efforts to reach certain conclusions from studying the chronology of the abductions, shootings and the riots, but "we need to know the overall pattern of how ... these events fit into an overall picture."

ABRI honorably discharged Prabowo in August and removed two senior Kopassus officers from active duty for their involvement in the abductions and torture of political activists.

The decision was issued on the recommendation of the seven- member Officers Honor Council.

"It is a matter of accessing ... the proceedings (of the council's investigation) that we feel ... if necessary we might have to look into the discussion within the DKP.

"The ABRI commander has assured us that we can have direct access to the members of the DKP and they will be prepared to (provide) information to the fact-finding team," said Marzuki, who is also deputy chairman of the National Commission on Human Rights.

He also said the 18-member team did not rule out the possibility that the military might have been involved in the riots, during which security was allegedly nonexistent.

"We are looking very closely into that possibility and into a variety of possibilities of links, but we cannot make any firm conclusion at this moment," Marzuki said.

Marzuki also said the team still could not disclose any firm figure on the number of sexual assaults and rapes that reportedly took place during the riots, because it was still conducting its investigation.

"It will be irresponsible (to come out with figures now) ... and therefore we can only come out with the firm statement that we have found that there is a very strong basis or evidence that sexual assaults and also rapes occurred during the riots," added Marzuki.

Marzuki reiterated the team was scheduled to announce the final report on its investigation next month.

Doubts about the occurrence of sexual assaults and rapes during the riots resurfaced on Thursday when House members criticized the team for failing to come up with hard evidence.

A non-governmental organization claimed on Thursday that it had hard evidence that the sexual assaults and rapes did occur during the riots.

Ester Indahyani Jusuf Lubis, the chairwoman of Solidaritas Nusa Bangsa, told a seminar that the organization had met with a doctor who treated seven victims of sexual assaults during the riots.

She said the doctor had secured their medical records, including pictures of the mutilated genitals.

A source close to the organization told The Jakarta Post that it intended to report the evidence to the rights body on Monday.

Activists, including those from the Volunteers for Humanity led by Catholic priest Sandyawan Sumardi, have said that 168 women and children were raped or sexually assaulted during the riots, 20 of whom have reportedly died or since committed suicide.

Jakarta Military Command chief of staff Brig. Gen. Sudi Silalahi was questioned by the team at the former's office on Thursday.

Sudi confirmed the riots were apparently instigated by groups of people in an organized manner but did not identify the mastermind.

Sudi was the seventh active or former government official the team had examined.

The others include former Jakarta military chief Maj. Gen. Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin and Prabowo. (byg/01/ivy)