The twenty first of May 1998 is celebrated by the Indonesians as the birth of reform in their country. It marks the resignation of the then President Soeharto who, at that time had been leading Indonesia for over 30 years. The road to this birth, however, was a bloody one. In May 1998 two gross violations human rights took place. One was the shooting of students by the military at Trisakti University in Jakarta on 12 May 1998. Four students were killed and hundreds more injured after the military indiscriminately opened fire against students peacefully demonstrating, demanding reforms and the resignation of President Soeharto. Following the shooting, widespread riots took place in Jakarta and other major Cities in Indonesia on 13-15 May 1998 which resulted in hundreds of deaths, whilst dozens others went missing. Sexual violence against the Indonesian-Chinese women was also widespread in the capital and some other major cities during this period.
The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) is concerned that justice remains out of reach for the victims in these cases and despite fifteen years of reform the state is reluctant to bring those responsible to trial. The government at that time set up a Joint Fact Finding Team consisting of members of the government and civil society to investigate the two cases. It came to the strong conclusion that both cases allegedly amount to gross human rights violations. The team further recommended the government to initiate legal proceedings in the cases and this was followed up by the National Human Rights Commission (Komnas HAM) who later investigated the cases in 2001. A year after, Komnas HAM referred the cases to the Attorney General Office (AGO) in the hopes that the latter will initiate an investigation and prosecution.
However, Komnas HAM’s investigation results have yet to be followed up by the AGO and as of today that the right to justice of the victims has been denied. In addition to the AGO, the House of Representatives (DPR) has been a barrier to the effective investigation of those cases. It, for instance, formed a Special Committee in 2001 which claimed that the shootings of students in Trisakti did not constitute gross human rights violations. The President has done nothing better in this sense. Apart from giving out medals to the four students in August 2005 and establishing a team ‘to find the best format for resolving cases of gross human rights violations took place in the past’, there had been no progress considered to be worth mentioning by the victims.
These two cases are nothing unique as there are a number of other past human rights violations cases that have been investigated by Komnas HAM which have become stuck in the hands of the AGO. This include the mass killings of ‘the communists’ in 1965-1966, the mysterious shootings in 1982-1985, the military’s violence in Talangsari, Lampung 1989, and enforced disappearances of activists in 1997-1998. Attacks directed against civilians in Wasior in 2001 and Wamena in 2003, both in Papua, are also in the list.
The reluctance of the government to hold legal proceedings against those involved in the above mentioned abuses is against the People’s Consultative Assembly Decree (MPR) number XVII /MPR/1998 on Human Rights which assigns state agencies and government officials to respect, uphold and disseminate an understanding of human rights throughout the society. Such decree led to the birth of Law No. 39 of 1999 on Human Rights and Law No. 26 of 2000 on Human Rights Court as well as to the country’s ratification of various international human rights instruments. Settlement of past human rights violations through legal process is part of the country’s reform mandate so that legal certainty is ensured and justice for victims is fulfilled.
Given the above, we urge the authorities below to take the following positive steps:
- For the President of the Republic of Indonesia — to instruct the Attorney General to immediately begin investigations of various gross human rights violations cases that have been investigated by the Human Rights Commission;
- For the Attorney General of the Republic of Indonesia — to immediately begin investigations into various cases of gross human rights violations that have been investigated by the Human Rights Commission;
- For the House of Representatives of the Republic of Indonesia — to conduct monitoring on the performance of the Attorney General in handling such cases and to ensure the passage of the investigation process.
If these parties take the necessary actions then reforms in the country’s justice system will truly be meaningful.
