[A-List] Indonesia: Wiranto indicted

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Ex-military chief charged with East Timor crimes

Jakarta refuses to hand over indicted general

John Aglionby in Jakarta
Wednesday February 26, 2003
The Guardian

The UN has charged Indonesia's former military chief, General Wiranto, six
senior army officers and East Timor's last civilian governor with committing
crimes against humanity during the territory's 1999 independence referendum.

Indonesia immediately said yesterday that it would never hand over the
indicted men for trial. But warrants are to be lodged with Interpol, meaning
the men will run the risk of arrest if they leave the country.

The main allegations against the suspects were "murder, deportation and
persecution", UN prosecutors said in a statement issued in the East Timorese
capital, Dili.

"[The alleged offences] were all undertaken as part of a widespread or
systematic attack directed against the civilian population of East Timor,
and specifically targeted those who were believed to be supporters of
independence for East Timor," they said.

The indictment focuses on 10 incidents, before and after the referendum, in
which 280 people were allegedly murdered, and the forced deportation of
200,000 East Timorese into Indonesian West Timor after the east
overwhelmingly backed independence in the UN-organised vote.

Other alleged offences include establishing and running local militias who,
with elements of the Indonesian military, carried out the terror campaign,
and failing to prevent their subordinates from committing crimes.

Along with Gen Wiranto, who was also defence minister at the time and
appears to be positioning himself to run for the Indonesian presidency next
year, the suspects include Major-General Zacky Anwar Makarim and
Lieutenant-General Kiki Syahnakri.

The three are not among the 18 people being tried by Indonesia's widely
criticised tribunal for East Timor, despite the country's human rights
commission recommending that they should be.

The tribunal has convicted only three people so far, among them Abilio
Soares, East Timor's last civilian governor, who was also indicted by the UN
yesterday.

The chief UN prosecutor in the case, Stuart Alford, rejected the Indonesian
military's claims that the pro-Jakarta militias which wreaked havoc before
the UN vote had emerged spontaneously, and that only they were responsible
for the violence.

"This was not a criminal enterprise that got out of control," he said. "The
militias were created, financed, armed, protected and trained by the
military. They cooperated together right up to the end."

Indonesia's foreign minister, Hassan Wirajuda, seemed surprised when told
about Gen Wiranto's indictment.

"He is a free man ... Why take action?" he said. "Who gave [the UN] a
mandate to indict Indonesians, under what basis, what authority?"

Even though East Timor became fully independent last May, the UN is still
running the country's serious crimes unit, in the absence of enough local
people trained for the task. Of the 170 people it has indicted for crimes
committed in the territory in 1999, 106 remain free in Indonesia.

One of Gen Wiranto's lawyers, Yan Juanda, said his client was innocent.
"Wiranto was one of the figures that tried to achieve peace, he was one of
the saviours, he evacuated the UN staff to a secure place," he said. "It's
not his fault."