[Kabar-indonesia] Groups Blast Jakarta on Activist's Death

[Joyo at aol.com]

Associated Press
October 8, 2006

Groups Blast Jakarta on Activist's Death

By ANTHONY DEUTSCH
Associated Press Writer

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Human rights groups criticized a Supreme Court decision 
overturning the 14-year prison sentence of a man convicted of killing 
Indonesia's most prominent activist. 

Munir Said Thalib, a human rights lawyer who was threatened in the late 1990s 
after revealing abuses by the Indonesian military, died of arsenic poisoning 
in September 2004 on a flight from Jakarta to Amsterdam. 

The Supreme Court on Tuesday said it had seen insufficient evidence to back 
up an earlier decision by a lower tribunal that an off-duty pilot, Pollycarpus 
Budihari Priyanto, had laced Munir's food with poison. 

The acquittal has angered many in Indonesia, where the case was seen as a 
test for a legal system still plagued by corruption after nearly three decades 
under former dictator Suharto. His regime, toppled by a popular uprising in 
1998, was known for the widespread imprisonment and killing of political 
opponents. 

"The failure to secure a conviction for Munir's murder is a huge blow for 
human rights protection and the reform process supposedly under way in 
Indonesia," said Brad Adams, Asia director for the New York-based rights group Human 
Rights Watch. 

Munir's wife, Suciwati, who like many Indonesians goes by a single name, 
maintains the murder was the result of a conspiracy by military intelligence 
members who wanted to get back at Munir for his activism. 

She has said the key to Munir's case lies in a trove of telephone taps 
between a high-ranking Indonesian general and the pilot, which the intelligence 
service refuses to make public. 

That theory was supported by Asmara Nababan, an Indonesian rights activist 
and member of the fact-finding team established by the government last year to 
probe the case. The team concluded that Priyanto had had contact with an agent 
from Indonesia's intelligence agency, information which never surfaced in 
court. 

Nababan said Sunday that if Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono 
"had given full support, I believe the murderer, the executioner and the 
mastermind could be punished by now." 

The president's spokesman told reporters after the court's decision was 
announced that Yudhoyono has ordered police to "improve and heighten their 
investigation." 

The criticism comes at an awkward time for Yudhoyono, a leading contender for 
this year's Nobel Peace Prize for helping to end a bloody war in Indonesia's 
Aceh province. 

Experts and bookmakers are predicting the Norwegian committee that awards the 
prize will honor the Aug. 15, 2005, peace agreement between the Indonesian 
government and Aceh separatist rebels which ended 29 years of fighting that left 
15,000 people dead. Former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, the mediator 
of the accord, is considered the favorite, followed by Yudhoyono. 

"As an Indonesian citizen I am proud he was nominated," Munir's wife told 
reporters after the court's decision, "but as a victim I feel he should never get 
the prize, unless he resolves this murder." 

Associated Press writer Niniek Karmini contributed to this report. 

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Joyo Indonesia News Service
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