Wisnoe Moerti – The Attorney General’s Office (AGO) has returned nine case dossiers on past gross human rights violations to the National Human rights Commission (Komnas HAM).
Attorney General Agung Prasetyo denied that this violated Law Number 26/2000 on an ad hoc Human Rights Court which mandates the AGO to form an ad hoc investigation team.
Prasetyo argued that no ad hoc Human Rights Court exists to try cases of human rights violations and that this is the obstacle in resolving past gross human rights violations.
“With regard to these cases an ad hoc court has to be formed first, this does not yet exist. This is the structural obstacle not because we are reluctant to do anything. Let alone going against the law”, asserted Prasetyo as quoted by the Antara state news agency on Friday January 11.
Prasetyo also said that the other obstacle in dealing with past rights cases is that they occurred a very long time ago. The nine case dossiers which have been returned to Komnas HAM, he said, among other things cover incidents that took place in 1998 and 1965, even before law regulating them existed.
“I can understand that whoever handles these cases would encounter difficulties and obstacles because it was too long ago”, he said.
Prasetyo then said that the nine cases dossiers were returned to Komnas HAM because the evidence is still incomplete.
According to Prasetyo, the evidence on the timing of incidents is not yet complete, moreover during a coordinating meeting attended by the Attorney General and Komnas HAM to examine the cases dossiers one by one it was concluded that there were still things that had to be completed.
“Of course we wouldn’t want to forward the case [for trial] without being confident that they are furnished with strong evidence because the result later if it's forced through would not be in accordance with expectations and we don’t want that”, he said.
The AGO returned nine case dossiers on past gross human rights violations including, among others, the 1965-1966 anti-communist purge, the 1989 Talangsari massacre, the 1982-1985 mysterious shootings of petty criminals, the 1997-1998 Trisakti, Semanggi I and Semanggi II student shootings, the May 1998 riots in Jakarta, the forced disappearance of political activists in 1997-1998, the Wasior and Wamena shootings in West Papua, the 1999 Simpang KKA shootings in Aceh and the 1997-1998 torture of detainees at the Geudong House and military post in Aceh. (noe)
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was “Kembalikan Sembilan Kasus HAM Berat, Jaksa Agung Bantah Membangkang Amanat UU”.]
