Rakhmat Nur Hakim, Jakarta – National Human Rights Commission (Komnas HAM) Deputy Commissioner Hairansyah says that 2019 was a gloomy year for human rights (HAM) in Indonesia.

This was conveyed during a virtual press conference on Komnas HAM’s annual report on Tuesday June 9. “2019 was a gloomy year for the upholding of HAM”, said Hairansyah during the press conference.

The year was marked by the killing of 10 civilians during demonstrations against the results of the 2019 presidential elections. To this day, the perpetrators have yet to be found.

Next it was marked by the killing of five demonstrators during protests against the ratification revisions to the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) law.

Meanwhile Komnas HAM received 2,757 complaints of human rights violations throughout 2019.

The majority of these were made in Jakarta with 421 complaints. The complaints in Jakarta were dominated by labour disputes with as many as 69 reports.

This was followed by North Sumatra with 273 complaints dominated by land disputes with as many as 64 cases.

In addition to this there were 73 cases of violations against human rights defenders in 2019, 27 of which were committed by police.

“So indeed in our report one of the factors in the HAM violations was that they were committed by state actors. This is I think something important in the 2019 report”, said Hairansyah.

[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was “Komnas HAM: 2019 Jadi Tahun Suram Penegakan HAM”.]

Source: https://nasional.kompas.com/read/2020/06/09/17162831/komnas-ham-2019-jadi-tahun-suram-penegakan-ham