---------------------------------------------------------- Visit Indonesia Daily News Online HomePage: http://www.indo-news.com/ Please Visit Our Sponsor http://www.indo-news.com/cgi-bin/ads1 -0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0 Free Email @KotakPos.com visit: http://my.kotakpos.com/ ---------------------------------------------------------- A GANGSTERS COURT By Otto Syamsuddin Ishak of CORDOVA It may be that the categorisation of States has changed. Experts are no longer talking about underdeveloped countries, developing countries and developed countries. Such categorisation is specific for developmentalist paradigm with orientation on quantitative and qualitative material increases produced and consumed by a nation. A paradigm that measures modernisation with a speed indicator of per-capita income, foreign exchange reserve -ignoring the human crises, the environmental crises and other related egalitarian social crises. Consequently, such developmentalistic paradigm can be regarded now as becoming classic and no longer humanistic and thus should rightly be dismantled. The paradigm that has been adopted as fundament now is that with humanistic character. The development of a nation is measured and categorised under the terms of uncivilized, civilizing and civilized. As stated in the preamble of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the source of uncivilised behaviours is the ignoring and the belittling of human rights. The consequence of such behaviour is the injuring of human's inner feeling. The more uncivilized the behaviour, the bloodier the injury suffered by the human's inner feeling. One of the dominant measuring stick used to consider the uncivilized and the civilized characteristic of a State is how far it values its civilian citizens. More specifically, is there a human rights court in that country. This is because the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: human rebellion is the last resort to oppose oppression and tyranny -where law does not protect human rights. The reason why the Republic of Indonesia can still be categorized as an uncivilized nation is because there isn't until now a level in its judiciary system for the protection of human rights. The convening of the connectivity court --to try the Bantaqiah humanity tragedy, the victim of the crime of the State-- is certainly reflecting the reality that, firstly, the Republic of Indonesia does not possess yet an international legal standard level in its judiciary system designed for the protection of human rights. As such, the convening of the connectivity court to try the crime against humanity perpetrated against the late Teungku Bantaqiah and his religious students, is nothing more than an ordinary criminal trial. It means that if there were a case whereby a soldier of the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI) or a member of its police force (POLRI) conspires with a civilian to kill somebody, such a case would simply fall into the jurisdiction of the connectivity court. It is thus quite possible, for example, that Agus Isrok (a Kopassus soldier) who with other civilians was allegedly involved in drugs trade, then this connectivity court too should try them. In brief, the connectivity court is not intended for cases of crimes against humanity perpetrated by the State, but a court for ordinary criminal cases whose perpetrators are a mixture of military men and civilians. Furthermore, if we consider the process of the upholding of the law in the Teungku Bantaqiah tragedy, it is very far from the process of the re-establishment of human rights that has taken place in East Timor. There is no human rights protection commission for Acheh and there is no international involvement. For the Achehnese case, the formation of an Independent Team has been considered sufficient. That, despite the fact that the Human Rigths Watch (HRW), a US based human rights NGO, has stated that the crimes against humanity in Acheh should be given the same international attention as for the East Timor case. Secondly, with the connectivity court, the Republic of Indonesia is showing the world that the said crime against humanity in Acheh is not a violation of human rights, but simply a criminal act carried out by some indiscipline soldiers abetted by a civilian informer. In reality, there are clear and solid elements of a crime against humanity carried out by the State. Those members of the Indonesian armed forced involved in the massacre consisted of two elements, to wit, the non-organic TNI soldiers from the strategic command KOSTRAD and the organic soldiers from the TNI Regimental Command Korem Lilawangsa. The non-organic TNI soldiers came from a number of units: Yon Linud 328, Yon Linud 305, Yon Linud 413 (all air defence battalions) and some companies of the North Sumatran Kiwal Kodam I/BB. This shows that the military operation is a joint military operation involving Kostrad and Kodam I/BB units that have been posted to Acheh. Then of course there has to be a top commander who held the responsibility for the joint operation. Who was he? He was the TNI's Army Lt.Col Haronimus Guru. In fact, the joint operation was reinforced with units of the organic battalion Yon 113/JS and the territorial soldiers of the Korem 011/Lilawangsa. So, if the organic and non-organic soldiers have the role as executor under the command of Lt.Col.Haronimus Guru, then the organic soldiers like the Army's Lt.Col Soedjono must have the role as the planner and overseer of the said joint operation. Both the field operational planner and the executor were under the command of the regimental commander of the Korem 011/Lilawangsa. In fact, on the basis of the telegramme sent by the Army Lt.Col Syafnil Armen to the battalion commander of Yon 113/JS, the deputy commander of the air defence units Yon Linud 100/PS, the commander of Yon Linud 328/DGH, and the commander of Tim Guntur Rem-011/LW, as well as the Intelligent Section chief of the Rem-011/LW Regiment - it is clear that this crime against humanity involved a number of names that have not been included as the accused in the charge-sheet of the cace, including Syafnil himself. Consequently, it is logical to consider that everybody in the chain of commands who has received copies of the telegramme sent by Syafnil should be charged as the main actors of this crime against human rights. In fact, 2 hierarchical levels of the actors should have been required to take responsibility. For example, who are sitting 2 levels above the regimental commander of the Rem 011/LLW?; who are 2 levels above the battalion commander of Linud 328/DGH and so forth. So it is very na�ve to consider that this crime against humanity should be focused only on Lt. Col. Sudjono, because there are several other actors, including Syafnil -and a number of commanders and 2 levels above them- who have not been included as the accused violators of human rights. Thirdly, if we consider that the main actors have been "saved" from the judicial process, then the connectivity court is in fact creating a new injustice. Only the soldiers are being sacrificed, plus a number of medium level officers who probably were not cunning enough to cover up the conspiracy, such as Capt. Anton Yuliantoro. They are just TPO members (Operational team Assistants), like Taleb Aman Suar -who were willing to be clothed in military uniform and armed, then ordered to execute civilians with an extra-ordinarily brutal military technique of violence. However, for us ordinary civilian citizens, there is a lesson that we can learn here. It is that in this nation called the Republic of Indonesian the respect of human rights is very negative. It means that the Republic of Indonesia is still existing in the category of uncivilized nation. Another interesting side of this case is that the perpetrators of the crime against humanity are still very much protected by the legal authorities (the court), by the security authorities (police) and by the defence authorities (military). It means that there is very high solidarity between them for the actors of the crime against humanity -that in post-script we can say that the accused are in fact still part of themselves or their institutions. So, is the civil society of Acheh has as high a solidarity to do the "amar ma'ruf nahi mun'kar"? (Quranic commandment to do good and prevent evil). In conclusion, the connectivity court is not a court with a human rights dimension, but just a gangsters court for human rights violators who are still on operation in Acheh. ---------------------------------------------------------- Abdul Halim EL Bambi Campaign & Networking Division Koalisi NGO HAM Aceh Aceh N.G.O's Coalition for Human Rights http://koalisi-ham.homepage.com (Translated by M.N.Djuli-SCHRA) ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Didistribusikan tgl. 1 May 2000 jam 04:48:49 GMT+1 oleh: Indonesia Daily News Online <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.Indo-News.com/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
