Jakarta – The Solidarity Action Committee for Munir (KASUM) is urging the government of President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo to immediately take responsibility for and solve the assassination of renowned human rights activist Munir Said Thalib.
Former Munir Fact Finding Team (TPF) member and Amnesty International Indonesia Executive Director Usman Hamid noted that the assassination of Munir occurred 20 years ago.
Yet, he said, to this day there has been no more formal initiatives by the government including taking legal measures to reopen the murder case.
"We know, Munir's assassination is a symbol of the structural problems in Indonesia", he said during a press conference titled 20 Years Since Munir's Murder at the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation (YLBHI) offices in Jakarta on Thursday September 5.
"Munir advocated a lot of human rights violation cases, therefore his assassination can be interpreted as an action to stop the struggle for victims of human rights violations", he added.
Hamid emphasised that based on the findings by the TPF it was clearly found that Munir's assassination occurred in a systematic way.
Therefore, he said that Munir's assassination was not a murder case that began with a mere quarrel. But was due to the courage of Munir who until the end of his life criticised government policies.
"Some of the last policies highlighted by Munir were the 2004 Draft Law on the TNI [Indonesian military] and the 2004 Draft Law on a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the two laws were passed not long after Munir died", he said.
"The murder can also be interpreted as an effort to kill the participation of citizens in giving birth to fair policies. Policies on development, security, or policies on resolving past human rights problems", he added.
He then expressed regret that a court hearing into the case in 2005 was still unable to reveal the involvement of the mastermind behind Munir's assassination.
According to Hamid, the current criminal justice system has not been able to uncover these allegations even though there were a number of findings by the TPF.
Hamid is therefore urging the government to immediately declare the Munir case a gross human rights violation and not an ordinary murder case.
"Because in the lens of the human rights law, Munir's assassination can be seen as an extrajudicial killing. In the lens of the court, crimes against humanity are attacks directed at civilians that contain systematic elements in the killing", he concluded. (tfq/DAL)
Notes
Renowned human rights defender Munir died of arsenic poisoning onboard a Garuda Indonesia flight on September 7, 2004. Although off-duty pilot Pollycarpus Priyanto was convicted of the murder in 2005, the alleged mastermind behind the assassination, former National Intelligence Agency (BIN) deputy Muchdi Purwoprandjono, was later acquitted of all charges. Also implicated in the murder but never investigated was former BIN chief AM Hendropriyono. Hendropriyono, a close ally of Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) Chairperson Megawati Sukarnoputri, was cited in US diplomatic cables leaked in 2011 as being involved in the planning of the murder. In 2014 Hendropriyono was appointed an advisor to newly elected President Widodo.
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was "20 Tahun Kasus Munir, Jokowi Didesak Tetapkan Pelanggaran HAM Berat".]
