Tribunal told of another senior officer's involvement
JAKARTA (JP): A military tribunal trying 11 Army Special Forces (Kopassus) soldiers charged with abducting political activists in the last months of the Soeharto regime heard evidence on Tuesday of the involvement of yet another higher- ranking officer who has yet to be prosecuted.
A witness, First Lt. Mujiono of the Jakarta Police Detective unit, testified that his superior Lt. Col. Bakat Purwanto instructed him to pick up three activists who would be handed over to the East Jakarta Military Command by an unidentified group of men on March 14 last year.
"A team of four police officers led by Capt. Arismunandar went to the East Jakarta Military Command in the afternoon of March 14 to pick up someone," Mujiono told the Jakarta Military Court in Klender, East Jakarta.
He said they waited at the military command until late at night but nobody showed up.
"We went back on Sunday, March 15 and we found three blindfolded and handcuffed people already there," Mujiono said adding that they were Aan Rusdianto, Nezar Patria and Mugianto.
They had been among 23 activists who were abducted by unidentified men beginning April 1997.
Nine of them eventually resurfaced after weeks of absence and have spoken of abductions and torture, one was found dead and 13 others are still listed as missing.
"At first, we did not see any signs of torture on their bodies, but later at the Jakarta Police headquarters, we noticed wounds on their ankles. It seemed that they had been bound up," Mujiono said.
He also said that on March 14, he met "five or six" long- haired men at the East Jakarta Military Command who identified themselves as security personnel from the intelligence office of the Jakarta Regional Military Command on Jl. Kramat in Central Jakarta.
"But I did not know why they were there nor what they were going to do," Mujiono said.
He also said he did not recognize any of the 11 defendants.
Another witness, Capt. Sudarso from the East Jakarta Military Command failed to show up on Tuesday. No explanation was given, and the court was adjourned until Thursday.
During the previous session on Jan. 28, a witness, First Lt. Pundit Purnawa, said that his superior Col. Jhon Lalo had instructed him to prepare a cell for activist Andi Arief on April 16 last year as Arief would be handed over to the police by a group of unidentified men later that night.
Andi, an activist of the Indonesian Student Solidarity for Democracy (SMID), a student front organization of the outlawed People's Democratic Party (PRD), was abducted by a group of unidentified men in Bandar Lampung on March 28.
The military prosecution had said the higher-ranking officers could also be summoned to testify.
Human rights activists have described the trial of the 11 Kopassus soldiers as a "farce", saying that it is only a charade to protect senior military officers and former president Soeharto.
The prosecution claims the defendants acted on their own initiatives and the charges put forward in the trial only related to the nine activists who have reappeared.
Some rights activists have also questioned why the charges did not mention the torture that the victims have said they were subjected to.
At the time of the abductions, the defendants were under the command of Lt. Gen. Prabowo Subianto who was honorarily discharged from the military in August for his involvement in the abductions.
Rights activists have been demanding that Prabowo, now in Jordan, must be put on trial as he had admitted his involvement before the Officers' Honor Council in August. (byg)