Trisakti students vow to meet with Wiranto

JAKARTA (JP): A gathering of 5,000 Trisakti University students, called "Sense of Unity", issued a statement yesterday demanding that the government thoroughly investigate the fatal shooting of four of their colleagues in May.

Participants of the gathering, held at the Istora Senayan Sports Hall, also expressed their commitment to continuing the student movement to support reform in the country, while at the same time ensuring the unity of the country in the midst of growing talk of a possible federal state.

The event itself was part of a series of freshmen orientation events.

The head of the gathering's organizing committee, Iwan Kurniawan, said that a university team intended to meet with Armed Forces Commander Gen. Wiranto in the near future.

"In our efforts to thoroughly get to the bottom of the shooting incident, the Trisakti University Student's Senate will form a small team to meet with the Armed Forces chief," Iwan said as quoted by Antara.

He said the recommendations to be presented at the meeting were still being drafted and no date had yet been fixed for the meeting with Wiranto.

Four students were killed when police fired on students who were demonstrating outside their campus on May 12.

Earlier this month, a military tribunal trying two policemen for ordering their men to shoot into the crowd of demonstrating Trisakti students sentenced the two to 10 months and 4 months in jail.

The two officers are the first of 18 security personnel to be tried in connection with the Trisakti incident.

But so far no one has yet to be charged for the actual shootings.

The shootings helped spark a bloody riot and gave the student demonstrations extra momentum which eventually led to the resignation of president Soeharto.

Assistant rector I Komang Suka Arsana said yesterday that university officials would assist the student senate in anyway they could to help them with their meeting with Wiranto.

He stressed that up to now there seems to have been little light shed on the fateful event of May 12.

"We need to do this (uncover the truth). Even though those who fired the shots wore a police uniform, who really fired remains a mystery.

"It could have been police, it could have been fake policemen, it could have been from other units. We should get the facts out in the open," Komang asserted. (mds)