Arientha Primanita – President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono openly expressed his annoyance with guests who were talking while he was delivering a speech on World Environment Day in Jakarta on Tuesday.

The President was about 10 minutes into a speech on environmental issues at the Presidential Palace when he suddenly stopped and reprimanded chatty attendees.

"I'll wait until those who are talking at the back finish," Yudhoyono said in front of hundreds of members of the audience. Silence fell across the hall at once as the President continued his speech, which lasted for another fifteen minutes.

Yudhoyono has been known to demand full attention from his audience, be it in Cabinet meetings at the presidential office or at other events. He is also known for scolding officials who fall asleep during meetings or talk among themselves when he is speaking.

"I've seen that some are asleep. It will be better if they sleep outside because it won't be good if TV cameras capture their pictures. People will wonder whether [the officials] are tired of leading their regions," Yudhoyono said during a working meeting with all the Cabinet ministers and heads of regional administrations in Jakarta early last year. (BeritaSatu/JG)

Surabaya bans cell phones from city schools

Antara News - June 1, 2012

Surabaya's elementary and high school students will return to school this July. Their cell phones won't.

"Having cell phones makes it difficult for students to concentrate," Surabaya mayor Tri Rismaharini said on Thursday.

The Surabaya administration announced on Thursday that it would ban cell phones from the city's elementary and high school by the start of the upcoming school year. The administration has already decided to ban elementary and junior high school students from bring cell phones to school.

City officials are mulling whether to ban cell phones in senior high schools as well. "We're still undecided whether to implement it in senior high schools and vocational schools," Tri said, "The initial idea was that it should be implemented at senior high schools as well."

The city plans to soon send a letter to schools in the East Java capital informing teachers and administrators of the new policy.

Schools will punish students caught bringing their cell phones to schools. Teachers can bring their phones to school, but have been barred from bringing them into the classroom. "Teachers who violate the regulation will be punished as well," Tri said.

The city plans to install phone booths in the schools so students can still call their parents, the mayor explained.

The deputy chairman of the Surabaya Education Council criticized the plan, calling it excessive and explaining that cell phones are a part of modern life. Schools and parents should focus their energies on teaching students when to use their cell phones instead of trying to ban them, Isa Anshori said.

West Papua

Yapen: Military sweeps and abuses against ordinary villagers intensify

West Papua Media - June 8, 2012

Information has been received from human rights sources on Yapen Island alleging that major security sweeps and blockades of villages home to non- violent political activists are causing mass [text missing].

A senior police officer in Serui told West Papuan activists that 140 more Kopassus personnel have been deployed from Jayapura, with two more companies of Brimob paramilitary police to be sent from Biak, reinforcing a significant build-up of military strength since April aimed at smashing West Papuan non-violent resistance to Indonesian military occupation.

The district of Angkaisera, east of Serui (14 villages), has been subject to an ongoing complete blockade and village raids by Indonesian security forces from June 7, preventing freedom of movement, and causing thousands of civilians to seek refuge in the jungle without food. This military psychological operation known by local West Papuans as a "show force", no- one has been able to gather to express their opposition to this brutal behaviour in front of the local parliamentary office of the DPRP.

It is being reported that seven people have been arrested today, reportedly under charge of Makar (subversion). The names and places of those arrested are not known at this stage.

On June 8 at 12pm local time, a truckload of Riot Police (Dalmas) and joined by plain clothes militia and intelligence agents, went to Wadapi village where reports of intimidation were made. The militia and riot police went back to Wadapi at 8pm together with 3 truckloads of joint taskforce army and police, and have occupied the village. According to West Papua Media's stringer in the area, the joint-force occupied the village while drunk.

Angkaisera has been surrounded with security forces for the last two days, according to local activists. Report have also been received that several political activists have been issued with letters to demand presentation to the local Indonesian police. Governor of the Yapen district for the Federal Republic of West Papua alternative government, Daud Abon, has been issued a second warning letter to hand himself into police. If he does not comply he will be hunted with full force, together with all other political activists in the area, according to the letter.

At the time of writing, news was received that raids were underway across Angkaisera district by joint-forces of TNI, police and Detachment 88, together with special forces of Kopassus, and Kostrad Strategic Reserve commandos from the Pattimura division based in Maluku, the Hassanudin divisions from Makassar, and the Siliwangi division from West Java, who have reportedly all been sent to Yapen. It is not known if these reports indicate entire battalions or just specialist companies from each division. West Papua Media has not been able to independently been able to verify these reports, as if correct will indicate a deployment of five battalions of fully armed combat forces, numbering some 7500 soldiers.

Further raids are expected to be carried out at 3 am local time in Anotorey and Mantembu villages, according to activists who are reporting that local people are terrified and very alarmed for their safety.

Videos and latest figures from Wamena provide evidence of army rampage

West Papua Media - June 8, 2012

Credible and trusted West Papua Media sources have provided video clips (below) that show the extent of destruction caused by the rampage of soldiers from the Indonesian Army (TNI) Battalion 756 in Wamena on June 6.

The soldiers, who ran amok in retaliation for the fatal beating by Wamena residents of two soldiers that killed a small Papuan boy in a motor incident, left a trail of destruction and violence across Wamena after a night of brutal and indiscriminate shootings, beatings and arson that has left at least 9 dead, 19 seriously injured, thousands homeless, and caused thousands of residents to flee to the relative safety of surrounding mountains.

According to local independent human rights activist Roni Lokbere, soldiers were firing indiscriminately at any Papuan they saw. "Anyone in sight of police and soldiers who have the black and curly hair, it is not forgiving – just automatic firing action," said Lokbere in a message with videos sent to West Papua Media.

"We make these reports based on true facts, the actions of the TNI and police officers who are arrogant and abusive, that ignore the principles of humanity and justice," said Lokbere.

Human rights workers in Wamena have identified a number of victims so far, but they report there are still many victims to be identified, with military and police personnel blockading the hospital to prevent relatives access to those who sustained injuries. This policy is causing great concern from local people that Indonesian security forces are committing further human rights abuses at the hospital in Wamena on survivors of the rampage.

According to fresh but separate unconfirmed reports received by West Papua Media, medical staff are being threatened by heavily armed military officers at the hospital, and soldiers and police including Australian- funded Detachment 88 counter-terror officers are directly interfering in the provision of treatment.

This information was provided at great risk by paramedics to Papuan human rights activists, describing the scenes of terror and intimidation still occurring at the hospital in Wamena.

At time of writing only members of the local Nduga tribal clan had been formally identified as dead, with several other tribes including Susa people, represented amongst an unknown number of total casualties. Many of those injured received significant wounds, and with the deliberate interference to medical treatment of the wounded by security forces, the number of dead is expected to rise.

Those formally identified are:

1. Jairus Lokbere, Nduga tribe, an unarmed member of Battalion 34/TPN (Tentara Pembebasan Nasional/National Liberation Army) Komadan Inije Kodap;

2. Kisiurt Kurungga, 21, villager; 3. Metiuspus Telenggen, 26, villager;

4. Elianus Bugiangge, 45, villager;

5. Pianus Tabuni, Nduga tribe, Civil Servant

6. Enus Lokbere, Nduga tribe, Local legislator of DPRD;

7. Two children aged 12 and 13 in local school "holiday village" (boarders staying in school "village" during holidays as their families cannot afford return to rural homes)

8. A man who died in the hospital who was not identified due to extent of facial injuries from beating with rifle butts.

Intelligence chief calls for security sweep in Jayapura

Jakarta Globe - June 8, 2012

Arientha Primanita – The head of Indonesia's State Intelligence Agency has spoken of the need for a sweep of Jayapura for armed civilians following heightened violence in the capital of Papua province for more than a week now.

Lt. Gen. Marciano Norman, the chief of the agency better known as BIN, on Friday indicated that a security sweep targeting men in possession of firearms might be conducted to prevent further attacks. He asked the public to understand the necessity of the move and to support it.

"We have no choice but to do the sweep, as civilians are not allowed to hold guns. Rules must be upheld," Marciano said over the phone. "I hope if the public see people having guns when they shouldn't, they will report it to police."

Marciano said the recent shootings in Jayapura, some of them fatal, were being carried out by armed groups, formerly dwelling in the mountains, who had begun to enter the town.

"One thing for sure is armed groups are entering the town, launching terror actions. We can see that their victims are comprised of TNI [Indonesian military] soldiers, police officers and civilians," Marciano said.

He added that the armed men had gained access to Jayapura because they had informants and support networks in the city. Prior to this, the armed groups only launched their attacks in jungles or mountainous areas.

Violence is not new to restive Papua, but shootings have taken place with increasing frequency in Jayapura since May 29, when a German tourist was shot and wounded in a drive-by shooting.

Monday saw a 16-year-old student also shot and wounded. On Tuesday, unidentified gunmen shot and injured two civilians and a TNI soldier. On Wednesday, a civil servant was shot dead in front of the mayor's office. On Thursday alone, there were reportedly three people shot, two of whom died, including a police officer.

All of these took place in Jayapura, with none of the attackers having been identified, nor arrested. Marciano said BIN was in the process of gathering information to track down the perpetrators. (BeritaSatu/JG)

Shoot first, riot later in Papua

Jakarta Post - June 8, 2012

Nethy Dharma Somba and Rabby Pramudatama, Jayapura/Jakarta – Two civilians were killed in separate incidents in Papua in separate incidents on Wednesday and Thursday involving Indonesian Military (TNI) members and police officers in Papua as security in the nation's easternmost province continue to deteriorate.

Hundreds of soldiers from the Indonesian Army's Yonif 756/Wamena battalion stormed the streets of Wamena on Wednesday, enraged over the death of First Pvt. Ahmad Sahlan, who was killed by a crowd in Honai Lama village.

The situation in the city was tense as the soldiers ran amok, setting fires, vandalizing houses and firing their weapons. One civilian was reported dead in the mayhem.

"His name is Elianus Yoman. He apparently died from gunshots," Papua Police deputy chief Brig. Gen. Paulus Waterpauw told reporters in Jayapura on Thursday.

Seven others were injured and seven houses, four motorcycles and one car were set afire, according to reports. "The city is restoring order. The police are patrolling and appealing to the citizens to remain calm," Paulus said.

One mother, however, said she immediately took her child home from school, having heard that there might be further reprisals. "I picked my child because it is rumored there will be another attack," she said.

In the second incident, Teyu Tabuni, 19, was shot dead by police officers in Jayapura on Thursday at 8 a.m. Jayapura Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Alfred Papare said that Teyu had been drinking alcohol with friends and was allegedly shaking down passersby and nearby kiosks for money.

Alfred said that Teyu and his friends resisted the police officers sent to disburse them. As officers moved to arrest the men, they fled, prompting the police officers to fire warning shots, once of which hit Teyu in the head. He later died in the hospital.

Alfred said that the police officer who shot Teyu was interrogated by investigators after the shooting.

Alfred's account of the shooting was rejected by Teyu's mother, Opina Wenda, who said that her son had not been intoxicated when the police arrived on Thursday. Opina alleged that the police officers who arrived on the scene were themselves drunk.

The incidents come following a wave of unsolved shootings targeting both law enforcement officers, Indonesian Military (TNI) troops, state officials and civilians. On Wednesday, Arwan, a civil servant and part-time motorcycle taxi (ojek) driver, was shot and taken to a hospital in Jayapura for treatment.

The deteriorating security situation prompted the Papua Police to detain Buchtar Tabuni, the head of the National Committee for West Papua, on Thursday. Buchtar Tabuni was reportedly taken into custody in Abepura as he got off a bus with two colleagues. He was indicted for allegedly instigating a protest in May that left two people dead.

In Jakarta, a human rights watchdog said that politics were behind the spate of violence in Papua.

"In all the shootings, the perpetrators did not take the victim's belongings, such as their money or valuables goods," Poengky Indarti, the executive director of human rights watchdog Imparsial, told reporters at a press conference on Thursday.

Poengky said that most of the victims were shot in vital spots, such as the head or neck, indicating that their assailants were trained marksmen and not run-of-the-mill criminals.

According to Imparsial, there have been eight deadly incidents in Papua in June – seven unsolved shootings, an assault and two stabbings – and a total of 24 violent incidents in Papua, since January.

Lawmakers on House of Representatives Commission I overseeing information announced that they would meet with several parties during a two-day working visit to Papua.

Commission chairman Mahfudz Siddiq told reporters that he would lead 11 lawmakers to Papua to discuss a dialogue for peace with different groups. "There's nothing we can do to resolve the ongoing conflict in Papua without dialogue," he said.

Police/TNI violence against civilians

Dec. 3, 2010: Miron Wetibo is shot dead during a security operation as the Jayapura Police and the Wira Yakti Military Command chase the perpetrators of a shooting in Abepura.

January 2011: Three soldiers allegedly torture two Papuans accused of being members of the Free Papuan Movement (OPM). The soldiers are later sentenced to 8 to 10 months in jail.

April 13, 2011: One person is killed as residents and police clash in Moenamani village in Nabire.

Oct. 10, 2011: Freeport Indonesia worker Petrus Ayamiseba is shot dead when police fire warning shots to stop protesting workers from entering the Gorong-Gorong bus terminal in Timika

Oct. 22, 2011: Six people die after the police and military use force to disperse the Third Papuan People's Congress. June 6, 2012: A civilian is found dead after soldiers run amok in Wamena following the death of a comrade.

June 7, 2012: Police warning shot kills a man in Jayapura as officers try to arrest a group of intoxicated youths for causing a nuisance.

[Margareth S. Aritonang contributed reporting.]

Bloody clashes with military rock Papua province

ABC News - June 8, 2012

Matt Brown, Jakarta and – At least a dozen people have been shot in a string of bloody incidents in Indonesia's Papua province.

While Indonesian officials blame Papuan separatists, local activists say the security forces themselves are responsible.

In the latest incident, soldiers are accused of going on a shooting spree at Wamena in the Baliem Valley.

The unrest began when two soldiers driving on the outskirts of town ran over a young boy and killed him on Wednesday. The villagers then stabbed one of the soldiers to death.

The local military spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Ali Hamdan Bogra, says other soldiers from the Brigade became so angry at the stabbing they left their barracks and headed into town. It seems clear they were seeking revenge. But Lt Colonel Bogra says senior officers stopped them and calmed them down.

Local activists say the soldiers, in fact, killed at least one person, who was buried yesterday. They may have killed others, because activists say several people who were wounded have disappeared.

"Almost all members of the battalion came down and started shooting whoever they saw," activist Sebby Sambon said. "They also burned our traditional houses. The military and police see us as a primitive people, they don't think we are human, they think we are animals and they can shoot us like animals."

Activists have also released a large number of unconfirmed photographs, which show Papuans suffering gunshot wounds and houses going up in flames.

They say members of the Australian-trained counter terrorism unit, Detachment 88, were working in support of the soldiers, as well as the notorious Mobile Brigade riot squad.

A local priest, Sofyan Yoman, says the authorities should have simply charged the villagers responsible. "Why did the soldiers burn down the homes of the common people.. and stab them with their bayonets? That's not protecting us, that's murder," he said.

National police said the military had been involved. "Following the road accident soldiers from the local military arrived in two trucks and took revenge by firing gunshots toward local residents and setting a number of houses on fire," national police spokesman Saud Usman Nasution told AFP.

"The trouble then spread to the city centre where a number of shops and houses were also damaged by gunshots."

However, Lt Colonel Bogra denies any military role in the shootings and says the villagers burned the homes and tried to blame the military. "We didn't burn people's houses. It's impossible. We're soldiers, we don't do that," he said.

More violence

It has been a dramatic end to a troubled week in Papua. In Jayapura on the north coast on Monday, police arrested more than 40 people at a rally by the West Papua National Committee.

They shot and killed one of the protesters and seriously wounded two others. Four other civilians and a soldier were shot in separate, mysterious incidents.

Human rights groups often blame the shadowy forces of local military and intelligence units for violence like this. But the police blame pro- independence groups and yesterday they arrested the head of the West Papuan National Committee.

Opposition MP Tubagus Hasanuddin – a member of the Parliament's Defence Committee – says he wants answers. "How can there be 30 shootings in one- and-a-half years and not a single case solved?" he asked. "Twenty-seven victims have fallen. We must find out why."

A team from the parliament's defence committee is travelling to Papua to investigate.

Alleged Indonesian military attack claims 10 lives in Papua: Elsam

Jakarta Globe - June 8, 2012

Erwida Maulia – Ten people were killed when the Indonesian Military (TNI) opened fire in an alleged retaliatory attack on a village in Wamena, Papua, on Thursday, a human rights activist in Jayapura said on Friday.

Members of the TNI's local Battalion 756 reportedly attacked the village on Thursday, killing ten, injuring dozens of others and setting an unknown number of houses ablaze, Ferry Marisan, director of the Papua office of the Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (Elsam).

It has been difficult to determine exact numbers or verify reports because the TNI has shut off all access to the village, Ferry told The Jakarta Globe in a phone call from Jayapura. "We've been having difficulties confirming the figures because we cannot access the Wamena village. It's been blockaded by the TNI," Ferry said.

Original reports Thursday night listed the death toll at one. It has since grown to ten and will likely continue to rise as dozen of villagers were reportedly injured in the attack, Ferry said. "We've got the number from some members of the Papua Legislative Council after a meeting with them yesterday," Ferry said.

The TNI allegedly attacked the village as revenge for a solider who was killed by an angry mob on Wednesday, Papua Legislative Councilmember Nason Uti said.

First Private Sahlan was reportedly stabbed to death in the village of Honai Lama on Wednesday after nearly hitting a child on his motorcycle. Another solider, Second Sgt. Pardede, was badly injured in the attack.

The Indonesian military have denied allegations that members of the TNI attacked the village.

"I have not received any report of that incident. We've stationed our soldiers around the area; no one is wandering around," said Infantry Col. Ali Bogra, spokesman for the Papua Military Command. "After [Wednesday]'s incident, the situation is under control now. There are no other significant things happening."

Violence continues with two more Papua shootings

Jakarta Globe - June 7, 2012

Camelia Pasandaran & Banjir Ambarita – Violence continued to escalate in Papua on Thursday as gunmen shot a woman and a police officer in the latest incidents of separate shootings in the restive province this week.

A 20-year-old man was also shot on Thursday morning in Jayapura – In total, eight people have been shot – and one soldier stabbed – in the province since Monday.

On Thursday afternoon, police officer Brig. Laedi was shot by two unknown gunmen in the Angkaisera district, Papua Police spokesman Adj. Sr. Comr. Yohanes Nugroho Wicaksono said. "Angkaisera police were shot at by unidentified gunmen," Yohanes said. "One officer was shot on the left side of his waist."

Police chased the gunmen, but they reportedly fled into the jungle, Yohanes said. "We are still investigating whether this is revenge for the raid of an OPM headquarters in that district," he said.

Two members of the Free Papua Organization (OPM) were arrested in a raid in Angkaisera on May 31 by members of the police and Indonesian military (TNI).

In Kerom district, a woman was shot on Thursday by an unidentified gunman, according to Papuan human rights activist Ferry Marisan. She was taken to Abepura hospital and her condition is unknown.

Police blame the recent surge in violence in Jayapura and surrounding districts on Papua's separatist elements. Ferry said he doubted groups like the OPM were behind the attacks, instead pointing the finger at Indonesian security forces.

"Papua is a place for law enforcement to get promoted," Ferry said. "Isn't it strange that after a series of shootings, the police cannot find the perpetrators? They always claim the perpetrators are unidentified gunmen. They analyzed the bullet, conducted ballistic tests but the results were never made public."

The activist criticized the Papua Police, saying officers should gather evidence before placing the blame on groups like the OPM, which is based in Puncak Jaya, more than 400 kilometers from the provincial capital.

"Their base camp is in Puncak Jaya, not in Jayapura," Ferry said. "Jayapura is not a big city, where there is only one main road running north to south. There is no way for OPM members to hide without being caught by police."

Ferry said the Indonesian government has an interest in prolonging the conflict in Papua. "If there is conflict here, there will be money from the central government for the police and military to solve the case," he said.

Jayapura Police admit shooting allegation

Jakarta Post - June 7, 2012

Jakarta – The Jayapura Police finally confirmed on Thursday afternoon that one of their members had killed a resident of Jayapura, Papua earlier this morning after previously denying the allegation.

Jayapura Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Alfred Papare was quoted by tribunnews.com as saying that the cop, referred to only as U, was currently being detained at the Papua Police internal affairs division for questioning.

"The officials are still delving for more information from him," Alfred said Thursday.

Previously, Papare said that Teyu had accidentally hit his head after falling into a river while trying to escape from the policeman, who was chasing him for extorting passengers in passing vehicles near a university in Jayapura.

However, medical reports from Jayapura Hospital showed that a bullet was found in the victim's head. (asa)

Another Papuan resident shot and killed by 'cop'

Jakarta Post - June 7, 2012

Jakarta – Another resident of Jayapura, Papua is dead and is suspected of having being shot and killed at 8:30 a.m. local time on Thursday, barely hours after a unknown shooter had taken the life of a civil servant the night before.

The victim's family members allege that the shooter is a member of the Jayapura Police. They are currently blocking traffic, demanding that authorities take responsibility for their loved one's death.

According to family members, the victim, Teyu Tabuni, was playing cards and dominoes with his friends when a police officer suddenly started chasing Teyu and fired shots at him. Jayapura Police, however, denied that one of their members had killed Teyu.

Jayapura Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Alfred Papare said that Teyu's cause of death was due to head injuries sustained from falling down when he was trying to escape from authorities who were trying to arrest him.

"A police officer who was patrolling had received a report that there were three residents who were causing trouble. The member came to the area in question, searched the bodies of the three suspects and found two kitchen knives and a cassowary bone shaped like a knife," Alfred said on Thursday, as quoted bytribunnews.com.

"One of the suspects tried to run away, so our officer fired three warning shots. The suspect ran towards a river, fell and probably hit his head on a rock."

Teyu's body is currently in a hospital morgue awaiting an autopsy to establish the exact cause of death. (png)

Mystery shooter kills civil servant in Jayapura

Jakarta Post - June 7, 2012

Jakarta – A civil servant of the Cendrawasih Military Command XVII was shot to dead by an unknown assailant in the city of Jayapura, Papua, on Wednesday night.

The 30-year-old victim, Arwan, was on his way home from work at 9:30 p.m. local time (7:30 p.m. Jakarta time), when he was suddenly shot in the neck. He died while being rushed to Marthen Indey Hospital, said Cendrawasih Military Command XVII Information Division head Infantry Col. Ali Hamdan Bogra.

"Arwan was going home from his office and while he was passing by the mayoral office, someone suddenly shot him," he said on Wednesday night as quoted by tempo.co.

The Indonesian Military was working with police to trace the attacker and beef up security in the city, he added.

Bogra said he still did not know what kind of weapon the shooter had used, or what the motive was. "This is the second time a colleague has been shot," he said.

He suggested the same person could have also shot a military official and two civilians on Tuesday at 10:10 p.m. local time (8:10 p.m. Jakarta time).

An unidentified assailant also attacked a school student on Monday and a German national was shot on May 29, with the identity of the attacker also unknown. (png/mtq)

Soldiers run amok after comrade killed

Jakarta Post - June 7, 2012

Nethy Dharma Somba and Bagus BT Saragih, Jayapura/Jakarta – Violence gripped Papua on Wednesday with a soldier killed and – in separate incidents – two people injured by gunshots.

Wamena, the capital city of Jayawijaya regency, was reported to be tense after soldiers ran amok, committing arson, vandalizing houses, throwing stones and shooting following the death of a comrade.

Jayawijaya Regent John Wempi Wetipo condemned the incident, saying that soldiers should serve as citizens' protectors and provide security. First Pvt. Ahmad Sahlan was reported to have been attacked by a crowd at Honai Lama village.

"According to information, a funeral was being held when two soldiers rode by. They knocked down a child and the crowd turned on them furiously, leaving Sahlan dead," John told The Jakarta Post, adding that the other soldier, First Pvt. Ahmad Saifudin, had been rushed to hospital in a critical condition.

Hundreds of soldiers later took to the streets but no fatalities or injuries were reported. John said he had not obtained details of damage caused by the rampaging soldiers only that a shopping mall seemed to have been the target of the shooting.

Colonel Hamdan Ali Bogra, the spokesperson of Cendrawasih military headquarters, denied soldiers' burned houses in retaliation. "I don't believe soldiers burnt residents' homes. I got reports that two shops were burned but by the crowd not by soldiers," he said.

Meanwhile, mysterious shootings continued with the latest victims a motorcyclist and a soldier in two separate incidents on Tuesday. The first victim was shot in front of the Transportation Agency, just 20 meters from the police headquarters in Jayapura, while the second was shot in the Entrop area.

"Iqbal Rifai and Ardi Jayanto were riding a motorcycle when they were followed by a man on a bike," Adj. Sn. Comr. Johanes Nugroho, spokesperson for the Papua Police, said on Wednesday. "Suddenly, gunshots were heard and Iqbal felt his stomach bleeding. They rushed him to hospital," he said.

The other victim was First Pvt. Doengki, who was shot by unidentified gunmen on his return from accompanying fellow soldier Brig. Ida. He was shot in the face and was treated at Dok II hospital in the city.

Tuesday's incidents have brought the tally of shootings to five in the past week.

In Jakarta, Presidential spokesman Julian Aldrin Pasha said that recent shootings and stabbings in Papua were proof that the situation in the country's easternmost region was still far from conducive.

"Separatist movements are still rampant both in Papua and West Papua provinces. We do not want this to happen all the time. Investigations are underway," Julian told reporters at the State Palace compound.

Shootings by unidentified people have occurred frequently in Papua for years but until now, the police have yet to arrest any of the perpetrators.

"That's because the geographical situation in Papua is difficult," Julian said when asked about the matter. Julian did not rule out the possibility of deploying more police and troops to the region.

Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Djoko Suyanto said the incidents would undermine the government's efforts to promote peace and development in Papua.

Army on rampage in Wamena after soldiers killed for killing boy in accident

West Papua Media - June 6, 2012

A bloody and brutal rampage by Indonesian security forces is currently underway in Wamena, in the Baliem Valley of West Papua, after two soldiers were killed for running down a small boy in Wamena on Wednesday afternoon.

At time of writing, up to 500 houses have allegedly been set alight by soldiers from Battalion 756 Mim Anesili Wamena, and kiosks and shops have been hit with flamethrowers in the suburbs of Honailama and Sinakma. Live ammunition is being fired indiscriminately according to local human rights sources, who claim that "scores" of people have been brutally beaten and shot by rampaging soldiers. Exact casualty figures have not been able to be confirmed, however unconfirmed claims are circulating that 13 people have been shot dead so far.

The situation unfolded on Wednesday afternoon in the outlying village of Honailama when two members of Kostrad (Strategic Reserve) battalion 756, identified as Pratu Ahmad Saifudin and Pratu Ahmad Saelan, were driving a car at speed through Honailama, and hit a young boy (as yet unidentified) who was playing at the roadside. The soldiers were alleged to have been careless, and enraged villagers – including clan members of the boy – dragged the soldiers from the car and beat them to death.

Upon hearing of the beatings, the entire army battalion (1500 combat troops) was mobilised onto the streets of Wamena, and according to witnesses, have opened fire indiscriminately at any Papuan person. The battalion is also being supported in a search and cordon operation by the entire Wamena Brimob police commando battalion, and also officers from the Australian-trained and funded Detachment 88 counter-terrorist group. All elements of the Indonesian security forces present in Wamena are participating in the rampage operation, amid unconfirmed reports of hundreds of arrests.

Local sources are reporting that the carnage is so intense that smoke is filling the entire Baliem Valley and covering the town.

A witness has spoken to the West Papua Media team and confirmed the situation in Wamena. "It happened in front of my house in the compound I live. Soldiers have shot and hit people. The army beat innocent people who know nothing and did not understand why. This is really a violation of human rights. My house was stoned and the glass window was shattered into pieces," the witness, who asked not to be named, told West Papua Media via SMS.

Human Rights sources in Wamena are saying that local people are terrified that the Indonesian army actions look like they will eclipse the "Bloody Wamena" incident of 6 October 2000. That incident saw hundreds of people wounded and at least 38 people shot dead or dying from injuries inflicted by Indonesian torture in the aftermath of a flag-raising incident.

According to Sebby Sambon, a Wamena-native human rights worker said, "Some friends called me a few hours ago top say that the TNI and POLRI are shooting local peoples in every place in the town of Wamena. Some Papuans civilians (have been) killed by TNI and POLRI two hours ago (about 7pm Wamena time - WPM). We hope UN and all UN member states keep their attention on the situation. " Sambon also said that TNI and POLRI forces are also burning local houses both in and outside the town of Wamena.

Indon police/military assault on Yapen targeting non-violent activists

West Papua Media - June 6, 2012

West Papua Media sources in Serui – Credible but unconfirmed reports have been received by West Papua Media reporting that a major operation is currently being carried out by a combined force of of Australian trained and armed police and military special forces.

One extra company of Brimob police commandos from Manokwari have been flown in to take part in the raids on the civilian village of Anotaurei on Yapen Island, near the regional centre of Serui.

Witnesses have alleged that a joint-force of Indonesian Army (TNI), Brimob commandos and the elite counter-terrorism force Detachment 88 (trained and funded by the Australian Federal Police) are intensifying their ongoing "Sweeping" against peaceful political activists and ordinary villagers.

The raid began at 11pm West Papua time in Anotaurei, and witnesses have claimed that 2 trucks, 3 police Avanza SUVs and a Kijang full of armed troops are patrolling and forcing entry in a house-to-house search and cordon operation.

Messages received by West Papua Media have alleged the troops are acting with great violence, and damaging property as they inspect homes, and seizing banned Morning Star banners and flags, sharp tools, kitchen equipment, and "documents" about the Free West Papua movement. These documents include flyers for rallies and pamphlets. Anyone found in possession of these are in danger of arrest, with Activists and human rights advocates expressing grave fears for their safety.

At time of writing the sweep operation is ongoing and likely to target outlying villages. This is a developing story – please stay tuned for more information.

Media and human rights organisations are encouraged to seek comment from the Indonesian military, police and intelligence commanders of this operation:

Kasat Intel Polres Yapen: +6281344300760
Kasast Serse Polres Yapen: +6281344554411
Kapolda Papua: +6281344230795 Kapolres Serui (Royce Harry Langie): +628128949494. Wakapol serui munazat: +628126892077

Freeport's Indonesian workers threaten strike amid tension

Bloomberg - June 5, 2012

Workers at Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc.'s Grasberg mine in Indonesia threatened to return to strike as tensions grow following the dismissal of three union members this month, a union official said.

"There's discrimination against workers who participated in last year's strike that is creating a lot of problems and the sacking of three of our members is making it worse," union spokesman Juli Parorrongan said today by phone from Timika, near the mine in Indonesia's Papua province. "We are in talks with the management. Hopefully we'll reach an agreement within two weeks otherwise I can't rule out another strike."

Freeport halted production at Grasberg, which has the world's largest recoverable copper reserves, for more than two weeks in February and March after violence flared following a three-month strike last year over pay that hurt global supply and boosted copper prices. Disruptions at Grasberg cut first-quarter output by 80 million pounds (36,287 metric tons) and 125,000 ounces of gold, Freeport said in April.

Sinta Sirait, an executive vice president at local unit Freeport Indonesia, said yesterday management isn't aware of any strike plan this month, while acknowledging tensions between employees who took part in the strike and those who didn't.

"The dialog between the two parties is taking place to try and solve the problem," Sirait said in an interview in Jakarta yesterday.

The company set up a crisis management unit to deal with the labor dispute, said Ramdani Sirait, a Jakarta-based spokesman for Freeport. He declined to say whether shipments from Grasberg have returned to normal after production resumed in March.

Civilian groups being armed in Papua, says human rights activist

Tabloid JUBI - June 4, 2012

The human rights activist, Sebby Sambom has declared that the Indonesian government has armed a group of civilian personnel in Papua which have been armed in order to carry out actions like the shooting of a foreign visitor, in order to damage the reputation of Papuan people in the outside world.

He said that the shooting of the German, Dietmar Pieper, was part of a political conspiracy of the Indonesian government to undermine international opinion regarding the People people, claiming that the perpetrator of the shooting was by someone from the OPM or its armed wing, Tentara Pembebasan Papua.

"The government has decided upon this conspiracy, now that the international community is paying greater attention to Papua, as was the case at a UN session on 23 May this year. The shooting was clearly the work of a Papuan who is now in the pay of the Indonesian government," said Sambom, who has spent time in prison as a political prisoner.

This can be proven, he said, by the fact that the Indonesians have armed some indigenous Papuans who have now decided to ally themselves with the Indonesians. He also drew attention to the emergence of other pro-NKRI groups in Papua such as the Barisan Merah Putih – the Red-and-White Brigade – which is trying to stir up conflict in Papua.

"I have proof of the fact that some Papuans have been armed by the government. I have in my possession the licences of some Papuan people who own guns and I am willing to show this evidence to someone from media or to the general public," he said.

This is all part of attempts being made to discredit the struggle of the Papuan people in the eyes of the international community.

Sambom said that it was very important to exert presure pressure on the Gernan govermnet to adopt a firm stand with regard the shooting of one of its citizens here on Indonesian territory. "The German government should press for an independent team to be set up to investigate who was responsible for this shooting," said Sambom.

Officials urged to act on shootings in fragile Papua

Jakarta Globe - June 2, 2012

Ezra Sihite & Farouk Arnaz – Authorities need to quickly arrest the perpetrators of a string of recent shootings in Papua, lawmakers and observers say, with the shooting of a foreigner on Tuesday sending a strong signal that the province is not safe.

While the government badly wants to convince the international community that its westernmost province is secure, the police's failure to stop the shootings or make any arrests shows otherwise, Tubagus Hasanuddin, deputy chairman of the House of Representatives' Commission I, which oversees defense and international affairs, said on Wednesday.

"We know that there is a certain group that wants to keep Papua in chaos. The police must arrest the members of the group quickly. Otherwise, the shootings will continue," he said, without identifying the group he was referring to. Tubagus said the shootings had damaged Indonesia's reputation abroad.

A German tourist was shot three times while walking along a beach in an apparently random attack in Jayapura on Tuesday, the National Police said.

Dietmar Pieper, 55, was at the beach with his wife, Eva Medina, 55, when an assailant opened fire at about 11:30 a.m. and then sped off in a Toyota Avanza minivan. Pieper survived the attack.

That same day, a teacher at a primary school in the restive mountainous region of Mulia was shot. And in another incident, a man shot Anton Arung Tambila, 36, a teacher and kiosk owner, in the head.

The bullet entered Anton's cheek and remains lodged inside his head. Both victims survived the attacks, according to the police, who say they are still investigating.

Since the start of the year, there have been at least six armed attacks on civilians and security personnel in Mulia, located in Puncak Jaya district, leaving six people dead. Among the attacks was an incident on April 8 when gunmen fired on a Trigana Air plane as it landed in Mulia, killing a journalist and injuring four other people.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has demanded that those responsible for the aircraft shooting be found, but police have yet to name any suspects in that case or any of the other shootings.

"We don't know why the police seem so impotent in handling killings in Papua," said Hendardi, a human rights activist and chairman of the Setara Institute.

Civil society groups allege the shootings in Puncak Jaya and around the Grasberg mine run by US-based Freeport-McMoRan are part of a rivalry between the police and military as they jockey for lucrative security payments.

Threats against Bintang Papua journalists reported by JUBI

Tabloid JUBI - June 2, 2012

Jayapura – According to several journalists working in Serui, Yapen district in Papua, including a journalist from Bintang Papua, they had been warned against publishing information about a demonstration that took place there on 29 May.

Bintang Papua has expressed its regrets about this information regarding what the police had done. Journalists have the right to report what happened regarding incidents like this.

The chief editor of the newspaper, Daud Sony said in response to a query from JUBI: "I have just received information from Seo, our contributor in Serui. He said that the terror and threats made by the police were highly regrettable.This is now the era of reform and space should be given to anyone to exercise the right of response, including journalists."

The Bintang Papua journalist who was in Serui had rung JUBI to tell them about intimidation and terror by the local police after they had sent a report about a demonstration by Wadapi inhabitants to the Yapen Legislative assembly, DPRD regarding the arrest of John Nuntian. "We were accused of inciting discord by circulating this report, but we had already sought and received confirmation from the police."

In addition to Seo, another journalist, Ulis Makabori reported that he had been intimidated by the police for reporting information about the demonstration. Ulis wrote a detailed report about happened during the demonstration.

Article 4 para (1) of Press Law 4/1999 states: "The freedom of the press is guaranteed as a basic right of all citizens, The press shall be free of any attempt to prevent, prohibit or use other means to prevent the population from receiving information."

[Abridged in translation by TAPOL]

Indonesian government claims successes in overseas diplomacy

Jakarta Globe - June 1, 2012

Indonesian diplomacy to allay international concerns about its policy of special autonomy for the province of Papua is slowly bearing fruit, Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa says.

Speaking at the House of Representatives on Wednesday, Marty said several countries had softened their stance on the policy, including Pacific island nations such as Vanuatu that have traditionally been opposed to Indonesia's administration of Papua. "Vanuatu has changed its position and now supports special autonomy in Papua," he said.

Vanuatu and Sweden are the only two countries with international offices of the Free Papua Organization (OPM), a separatist group. The OPM's office in Port Vila was set up in 1987 by an activist from the office in Stockholm.

At the time, Vanuatu was also the only country in the region to support the right of East Timor, another area taken over by Indonesia, to self- determination.

But in a statement published by the Vanuatu Daily Post on May 22, the prime minister's office said its stand on Papua for the past 30 years "has not achieved the intended result."

"The country has made enormous sacrifices by not being able to establish relations and closer cooperation with Indonesia and being able to source aid and assistance from Indonesia," it said. It also said that "Indonesia and West Papua will always be intricately connected in a manner which defies the true meaning of independence."

Tubagus Hasanuddin, deputy chairman of House Commission I, which oversees foreign affairs, suggested that opposition to Indonesia's policies in Papua could be tackled by addressing the human rights violations and discrimination of the region's ethnic Melanesian residents.

"Stop the rights violations and discrimination, because this is what makes Papua" a cause for concern for the international community, he said.

Aceh

Aceh to ban sales of tight clothing

Deutsche Presse Agentur - June 7, 2012

Ahmad Pathoni, Banda Aceh – Shops in Indonesia's Aceh province, where Islamic law is in force, will soon be banned from selling tight-fitting clothes, an official said on Thursday.

The announcement was made after religious police in the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, stopped and reprimanded more than 50 women and three men for violating the Islamic dress code, including wearing tight clothing and shorts.

Samsuddin, the head of enforcement at the agency overseeing compliance with Islamic law in Aceh, said his office would issue a circular banning shops from selling body-hugging fashion items.

"We will soon send letters to shop owners," Samsuddin said. "The newly elected governor very much supports the enforcement of Islamic law." Zaini Abdullah is due to be sworn in as Aceh's new governor on June 26 after winning an election in April.

Shariah police in Aceh regularly carry out patrols to enforce the rule of Islamic modesty and a ban on unseemly contact between unmarried couples.

Officers recorded the personal details of those behaving in an unseemly manner, lectured them, and told them they could be detained or lashed if they were caught again.

Samsuddin said his officers had netted 300 women who violated the Islamic dress code in the past two months. Munway, one of the three men stopped for wearing shorts in Thursday's operation, pleaded for leniency.

"I'm a construction worker and I'm laying bricks," he told a woman officer who asked him to show his identity card. "I'm outside because I'm going to buy some paint." Munawar said he agreed with Islamic law but men should not be arrested for wearing shorts.

Under Aceh's Islamic law, the sale of alcohol is banned across the province and gamblers are punished by caning.

The law was imposed in 2001 as part of special autonomy granted by the central government to pacify a clamor for independence in the province on the northern tip of Sumatra.

The separatist conflict killed an estimated 15,000 people, mostly civilians, before it ended with the signing of a peace pact between the government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) in 2005.

Human rights & justice

Torture in Indonesia on the rise in 2012, organization's figures reveal

Jakarta Globe - June 5, 2012

Rizky Amelia – The number of torture cases involving state officials continues to rise and has left 10 people dead in four months, according to a study by the Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy.

Wahyudi Djafar, coordinator for policy observation at the institute known as Elsam, said 22 torture cases involving 30 people had been recorded between January and April this year. They were committed during the process of arrest, interrogation and detention.

"In the period of four months, Elsam recorded at least 22 torture cases; battery, violent and inhumane actions that occurred in prisons," Wahyudi said in a news conference on Sunday.

He said four cases occurred in January, but the number increased to six the following month. There were five and seven cases respectively in March and April.

Wahyudi blamed weak supervision and a lack of sanctions for the increasing number of torture cases. He cited several examples of prisoners who died of torture in Indonesian jails.

He said that Erik Alamsyah, 21, died in a North Sumatra prison. In Semarang, Suryo was found dead on Feb. 3 after being detained a day earlier by the Central Java Police. The high number of cases, Wahyudi said, showed the authorities had not changed their approach to interrogation, which has been strongly criticized.

"Interrogations are often conducted in an inhumane way to get confessions," Wahyudi said.

Torture has occurred across the country, including in Jakarta, East Java, Central Java, West Java, Lampung, Papua and North Sumatra.

Most torture cases involve police officers who use inhumane methods to glean information or get evidence from prisoners. Out of the 22 torture cases, 12 were committed by police officers.

Sorry won't cut it in Indonesia human rights cases: Tjahjo

Jakarta Globe - June 3, 2012

SP/Robertus Wardi – The government must be serious about bringing a raft of alleged human rights abuses to trial, in light of international scrutiny of Indonesia's track record, a senior opposition legislator said on Friday.

Tjahjo Kumolo, the secretary general of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), said no indications of rights abuse should be ignored.

"No matter how small the cases, human rights problems should be dealt with," he said "As with a wound, it should be cleaned. All cases should be resolved legally."

Indonesia, he said, had a ministry specifically for human rights issues, as well as an independent rights commission and a host of nongovernmental organizations concerned with the issue, giving the government little excuse to ignore any cases.

Tjahjo's remarks came a week after Indonesia was criticized at a United Nations rights review for a rise in intolerance and attacks against religious minorities, as well as impunity for security forces accused of rights violations.

Tjahjo said the impact of failing to address these problems was severe, citing a previous US prohibition on arms sales to Indonesia in light of abuses by the military in East Timor.

"We could face international isolation. It's only reasonable to expect other countries to spotlight human rights conditions in Indonesia," he said.

He added that a blanket apology from the government for past rights abuses was not enough. "It's not just a matter of apologizing. Human rights matters should be settled justly, so that the victims can obtain legal certainty," Tjahjo said.

Budget cuts pull more teeth from Komnas HAM

Jakarta Post - June 1, 2012

Margareth S. Aritonang, Jakarta – The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has come under criticism for its poor performance in promoting human rights protection.

Early this month, some survivors from the 1965 purge came to the commission's headquarters in Central Jakarta accusing its members of siding with rights abusers by intentionally concealing the results of its investigation into the systematic prosecution of Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) members following the abortive coup.

"The public must understand that we have no authority in law enforcement," Komnas HAM chairman Ifdhal Kasim said recently.

Established in 1993, Komnas HAM was assigned by then president Soeharto to review, monitor, and investigate human rights violations and to provide education on human rights to members of the government, including the police and military. Since 1999, its existence has been guaranteed by law.

Speaking before lawmakers on Thursday, Komnas HAM commissioner Kabul Supriyadhi emphasized the urgency to amend the 1999 law enabling the commission to give it law-enforcement powers. So far, it only issues recommendations. "We do make recommendations based on our investigations on cases of violence involving human rights occurring all across the archipelago.

Actions have been taken in some of the cases, but many of them have not [been acted on]. Komnas HAM is required to submit recommendations on cases of human rights violations to the executive and legislative institutions for further action. Sadly, things don't happen as is expected."

In a report on Indonesia's human rights record submitted to the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), Komnas HAM said that it had informed the Attorney General of the results of its investigations of several cases, including the May 1998 riots, the Semanggi and Clover II incidents in 1998, forced disappearances in 1997 and 1998, and massacres in Wasior and Wamena in Papua. However, no action was taken on any of the reports.

During the hearing on Thursday, Komnas HAM urged House Commission III overseeing law and human rights to seriously consider the commission's proposal to amend its enabling law to give it a stronger role in promoting and protecting the rights of the people, especially as it would hold a plenary meeting in early June to raise recommendations to follow up its findings on 'huge cases' such as the 1965 purge and the Lapindo mudflow.

"What will happen to the results of our findings on such cases? Will they be ignored just like many others?" Kabul said.

In addition to a 'weak' legal foundation, Komnas HAM is also facing financial constraints, as its budget this year has been reduced from Rp 64 billion (US$6.78 million) to Rp 53 billion. Moreover, it has to give Rp 10 billion of that to the National Commission on Violence against Women, with which it also shares headquarters.

"We are caught in a very difficult situation. We are funded by the state budget and mandated by the government on one hand, but we are required to be independent on the other hand in order to fully promote justice for the people," Komnas HAM commissioner Nur Kholis said.

According to Komnas HAM data, the National Police was the institution most reported by the public in the last four years, with 1,839 reports.

The commission's leader, Ifdhal, said a limited budget would also constrain the rights body to conduct proper investigations of human rights violations in the future.

Commenting on Komnas HAM's proposal for increased funding, Commission III chairman I Gede Pasek Suardika said that the House would support the commission as long as it showed excellent performance.

Komnas HAM in time

June 7, 1993: President Soeharto signs a presidential decree on the establishment of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM). Lt. Gen. (ret.) Ali Said is appointed chairman of the commission.

Sept. 8, 1999: The House of Representatives endorses the Human Rights Law, which recognizes, promotes and protects basic freedoms.

June 23, 2000: Some 300 members of the Islam Defenders Front (FPI) attack the commission's headquarters in Central Jakarta. The assault is in protest of a report by the commission's investigative team on the 1984 Tanjung Priok shootings in North Jakarta.

April 2008: The Commission drafts a revision to the Human Rights Law, hoping to garner more authority.

Freedom of speech & expression

Indonesia needs law on hate speech: Activists

Jakarta Post - June 5, 2012

Jakarta – Even though the Constitution guarantees freedom of expression, the nation needs tougher regulations to deal with religious hate speech that might lead to violence, rights activists say.

The executive director of the Indonesian Legal Resource Center, Uli Parulian Sihombing, said on Monday that hate speech was responsible for sparking religious conflict in the country.

"We need a regulation that can deter people from making hate speech without limiting the freedom of speech," he said in a discussion with The Jakarta Post on Monday. He said that the current regulation against hate speech, Article 156 of the Criminal Code on spreading hate, was not effective.

The article states "anyone who publicly expresses enmity, hatred or insults against one group or some groups of Indonesians" can be imprisoned for up to four years.

The article said that "groups" referred to differentiations based on, among other things, "race, country of origin, religion, location, origin, descent, nationality".

Law-enforcement officials have been hesitant to enforce existing law, Uli said. "The police were apparently hesitant to apply the article, because it does not specifically address religious hate speech, but speech in general."

Uli said that hate speech had been responsible for sparking violent clashes in the community. He also said that the exercise of free speech could turn into hate speech if it incited others into attacking people who were targeted in the verbal statement. "That's where we draw the line."

Uli highlighted the April 15 skirmish that involved Islamic hard-line vigilantes and members of the HKBP Filadelfia church in Bekasi, east of Jakarta, that was sparked by a Muslim cleric who reportedly made a speech inciting the crowd to violence against the Christians.

In February 2008, a another cleric told people at an Islamic religious gathering in Tasikmalaya, West Java "to kill Ahmadiyah followers", saying it was proscribed (halal) for Muslims to spill the blood of Ahmadis.

As a minority sect of Islam, Ahmadiyah has consistently been the subject of attacks from various groups who consider them heretics.

Ali Akbar Tanjung from the Human Rights Working Group (HRWG) said that given the worsening trend in religious violence, members of the House of Representatives must enact a law that would criminalize hate speech.

"House members can either revise Article 156 of the Criminal Code or add regulations on hate speech to the religious harmony bill currently being discussed at the House," he said.

Separately, Abdul Hakim, a Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) lawmaker on House Commission VIII overseeing religious affairs, said that the bill was not at the top of the House's legislative agenda for the next two years.

Hakim, however said that the House could include the bill on the list if NGOs and other organizations stated their case convincingly. "They must present their version of the draft bill to us so the lawmakers can study it better," he told the Post.

Meanwhile, National Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Boy Rafli Amar said the police could persecute hate speech directed against religious minority groups, such as members of the HKBP Filadelfia, using existing laws. "We will review the reports in accordance to the existing law," Boy said. (asa)

Djoko Suyanto prays for FPI after chief calls him a pimp

Jakarta Globe - June 4, 2012

Arientha Primanita – Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs Djoko Suyanto said on Monday that he would pray for Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) chief Rizieq Shihab after Rizieq called him a pimp.

"May God the Almighty give him guidance and forgive him," Djoko said at the State Palace on Monday. Djoko said that he was aware of what Rizieq called him. "[I'm] not upset," Djoko said smiling.

The war of words between Rizieq and Djoko started when dozens of FPI members demonstrated in front on Djoko's office regarding the the Lady Gaga concert.

Commenting on the rally, Djoko said "EGP," an Indonesian slang acronym meaning "I don't care". "Why bother commenting on a demonstration? Like I don't have better work to do," he added.

Rizieq immediately said that such statement should not come out from a mouth of a public official. "It sounds the same statement a pimp in a prostitution house who would likely say," Rizieq said.

'Little Monsters' flock to the site of Lady Gaga's canceled show

Jakarta Globe - June 3, 2012

Arientha Primanita & Dessy Sagita – Lady Gaga was never going to show up at Jakarta's Gelora Bung Karno stadium on Sunday. But that didn't stop dozens of fans from gathering outside the stadium for a rally against the increasing influence of Indonesia's hard-line Islamist organizations.

Fans, known as "Little Monsters" placed flowers outside the stadium in a mock memorial service for "the death of freedom of expression in Indonesia." Others staged a flash mob, dancing for seven minutes to a mix of the US pop star's hits.

"We recorded [the rally] and uploaded it to the Internet so the world can see that not all Indonesians condone violence," said Tria Meirina, one of the organizers of Sunday's event.

Lady Gaga canceled her June 3 concert amid threats from the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), a hard-line Islamist organization. The National Police were cautious about issuing the concert a permit after the FPI threatened to storm the concert and "do what they must to stop the show."

Ravi Agustiana came to Sunday's demonstration after spending her entire savings on a ticket. "I was so disappointed and sad when I heard that Gaga's concert was canceled," the 19 year-old said adding that she came on Sunday to ease the pain of not being able to see the singer live.

Fia Rahmatia, of Bandung, West Java, said she spread word of the rally through the Twitter account @IndoProGaga. Fia said that she was moved by Lady Gaga's message of tolerance and equality.

"What we grasp from Gaga's [message] is that we have to be courageous, have self respect, embrace diversity and Gaga also teaches about equality," she said. Others demonstrated outside the State Palace in Jakarta.

The gay and lesbian rights group OurVoice plans to file a complaint with the Indonesian National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) over the Gaga debacle.

"This is not just about entertainment but something far more serious than that. This is an indication that we have lost our freedom," OurVoice secretary general Hartoyo said.

Hartoyo said the government should not regulate art and entertainment. "The music we hear, the books we read, the movies we watch, it is all regulated. What is this the stone age?" he asked.

Media & press freedom

Indonesia military chief plays down assault on journalists

Jakarta Globe - June 2, 2012

Arientha Primanita, Ezra Sihite & Rahmat – Military chief Adm. Agus Suhartono denied on Wednesday that members of the Navy had deliberately assaulted journalists in Padang, West Sumatra, a day earlier, but did admit that the soldiers involved had apologized to the reporters and would be duly punished.

"It was not abuse, and there was no intention to abuse," he said at the Presidential Palace. "But in the process, undesired things happened, as they often do."

Seven journalists, most of them from national TV stations, were reportedly injured after being assaulted by 12 members of the Navy as they were covering the closure by the public order agency (Satpol PP) of huts used for prostitution.

Agus said a member of the Navy was a relative of one of the hut owners, and came to their defense as Satpol PP moved in. According to Agus, several other members of the Navy, who happened to be on a trip from Bungus to Padang, stopped when they saw the commotion and rushed to the defense of their fellow soldier.

Four journalists were subsequently beaten in the brawl, while three others had their cameras seized by the servicemen.

However, Agus said the Navy members realized that they were in the wrong. "The soldiers realize that [what they did] was not right, and they have been reprimanded," Agus said. He added that the Navy would punish those involved in the incident.

That was not enough for the House of Representatives, though, which said it would question Agus and the Navy chief, Adm. Soeparno, about the assault.

"To maintain the image of the Indonesian military and to uphold the discipline of the soldiers, House Commission I will ask for an explanation from the military and Navy chiefs to prevent these kinds of incidents from happening again," said Mahfudz Siddiq, chairman of House Commission I, which oversees defense affairs.

Journalists in Batam, Mataram, Semarang rally against assaults

Jakarta Post - June 1, 2012

Syofiardi Bachyul Jb and Panca Nugraha, Padang/Mataram – Journalists in three cities in the archipelago took to the streets on Thursday to protest the assault of their peers by Marines in Padang, West Sumatra.

The protests in Batam, Riau Islands; Mataram, West Nusa Tenggara; and Semarang, Central Java were reportedly launched in solidarity with the seven journalists who were attacked by Marines while covering raids led by the Padang Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) during a prostitution crackdown on Tuesday.

Aside from assaulting the journalists, the Marines also allegedly "confiscated" their cameras, videotapes and memory cards.

In Padang, a journalist criticized Indonesian Military (TNI) chief Adm. Agus Suhartono, who said on Thursday that a peaceful settlement of the "conflict" between journalists and Marine Corps had been reached.

"There hasn't been any declaration of peace for the violence against journalists. The TNI chief's remarks are misleading and tend to further confuse the case," Hendra Makmur, chairman of the Padang chapter of the Indonesian Independent Journalists (AJI), said on Thursday.

According to Hendra, the assault of the journalists constituted a violation of the Press Law and the Criminal Code, neither of which allowed for the "peaceful" settlement of criminal allegations.

"We have to underline here that in the meeting with Lamtamal [Padang Second Naval Fleet Marine Defense Battalion] commander Brig. Gen. Gatot Subroto at the West Sumatra Legislative Council on Wednesday, it was emphasized that the case had to be settled thoroughly," Hendra said.

"We just met and did not make any peaceful settlement," he added.

Meanwhile, Rino Zulyadi, the chairman of the West Sumatra office of the Indonesian Television Journalists Association, echoed Hendra's sentiments, saying that during the meeting, Gatot admitted wrongdoing by his subordinates, expressed regret and promised to take stern action against the perpetrators.

At least 11 Marines implicated in the incident had been detained and await military justice, Gatot said as previously reported.

Rino was critical of Agus. "We ask the TNI chief to abide by the legal process and not to make any misleading statements," Rino said.

Hendra also said that Agus' statement was one-sided, irrelevant and could be misinterpreted. "We have taken the matter to the legal process and we will monitor the entire proceedings."

In Mataram, up to 30 journalists rallied in front of a local naval base, making speeches and placing all of their journalistic equipment in front of the base gate.

"The world of journalism is again mourning after journalists were beaten and their right to report was curbed. Ironically, the violent acts were carried out by security officers who should have been the protectors of the journalistic activities," Samiarto, a local journalist, said.

He urged the authorities to thoroughly investigate cases of violence aimed at journalists, mentioning previous unresolved high-profile attacks or murders of reporters.

"We hope the case of violence perpetrated against Udin in Yogya, Prabangsa in Bali and Ridwan Salamun in Maluku will not be repeated in West Nusa Tenggara," he said.

Bernas daily journalist Fuad Muhammad Syarifuddin, also known as Udin, was murdered in 1996 while reporting on corruption in Yogyakarta – Prabangsa, a reporter with Radar Bali, was reporting on local corruption when his body was found in a river in 2009. Ridwan, a Sun TV reporter, was killed covering ethnic violence in Maluku.

"The case in Padang should be the last for the Indonesian press," Samiarto added.

A similar request was made by journalists in a rally in Semarang on Thursday who demanded that the Marines allegedly implicated in the assaults be brought to justice, according to kompas.com.

In Batam, 50 journalists rallied outside the local Navy base in solidarity with their colleagues in Padang.

William Sipahatu, one of the journalists, urged the Navy, which oversees the Marine Corps, to be serious about preventing future assaults of journalists.

"We urge the Navy to stop any form of violence. Journalists are not to be beaten up," he said.

[Fadly contributed reporting from Batam.]

Political parties & elections

Parties to tighten recruitment of celebrities

Jakarta Post - June 5, 2012

Margareth S. Aritonang, Jakarta – Following the sudden resignation of one of its lawmakers, the Democratic Party said that it would apply a stricter measure in the recruitment of celebrities to become members of the House of Representatives.

Singer-turned-lawmaker Theresia "Tere" Ebenna Ezeria Pardede announced her resignation late last week, stepping down from her position as a member of Commission X overseeing education, youth, and cultural affairs. Tere said she wanted to focus on caring for her ailing father and to finish her master's thesis, apparently irking some members of the party.

Democratic Party faction leader Nurhayati Ali Assegaf looked angry when asked about the issue. She also declined to comment further. "I don't want to talk about her anymore. We talked enough about her last week. She is our past. We need to focus on other more important matters," Nurhayati said on Monday.

Tere has defended her decision saying that "Indonesian politicians lack the courage to resign from their positions when they fail to perform."

Meanwhile, the party's deputy secretary-general Saan Mustopa said that Tere's resignation showed that it took more than popularity to become a lawmaker. "It's not always true that celebrities are vote-getters because the votes she [Tere] secured were not that significant," he said.

Saan said that the party would review its policy on recruiting celebrities soon. "What we really need are individuals committed to improving the party, who will in turn help strengthen the system within the legislative institution," Saan told reporters at the House on Monday.

He said that the party would improve its recruitment mechanisms for the 2014 legislative election to allow a combination of qualified and popular candidates to win votes.

Other political parties, however, intend to recruit more celebrities for the 2014 election.

Martin Hutabarat, an executive of the Great Indonesian Movement (Gerindra) Party said that a number of entertainers had approached him soon after the House endorsed the election bill on April 12.

The new election law maintains an open-list system that allows voters to choose the most popular candidates on the roster of candidates.

Golkar Party has also courted celebrities including singers Syahrini, Mulan Jameela, and Ahmad Dani to join its political campaign.

Akbar Faisal from the People's Conscience (Hanura) Party said that it had learned its lesson and would not nominate celebrities as candidates.

"There are no celebrities among the party's current 17 lawmakers. This doesn't mean that we don't like celebrities. We do, but we don't trust the future of the party to the hands of celebrities," he said.

Indonesia's Dems give ultimatum over Anas, but deny pressuring the KPK

Jakarta Globe - June 2, 2012

The Democratic Party has given antigraft officials until the end of next month to either name their chairman a corruption suspect or exonerate him of any role in a bid-rigging case.

Syarief Hassan, a member of the ruling party's board of patrons, said on Wednesday that the suspense over chairman Anas Urbaningrum had been dragging on for far too long.

"We don't want to be held hostage to such a process. If by end of June no action is taken [against him], then it means that Anas is clean," Syarief said in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan.

He was quick to add that the demand should not be seen as an attempt to pressure the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) or intervene in its work. "We just hope that Anas's legal status can be made clear soon," he said.

Should the KPK not decide anything by the end of June, he added, this should be acknowledged as recognition that the allegations against Anas were unfounded.

Anas has been named by high-profile graft convict Muhammad Nazaruddin, the former Democrat treasurer, as having received kickbacks to help rig a bid for the construction of the Hambalang sports center in Sentul, Bogor.

Nazaruddin, who was earlier this year convicted in a separate but similar bid-rigging case, claimed that Anas took Rp 100 billion ($10.6 million) from one of the winning contractors, which he allegedly used to fund his bid to become the Democrat chairman in 2010.

Anas has also been implicated in the Hambalang case by several witnesses in Nazaruddin's trial. Nazaruddin has also fingered Sports Minister Andi Mallarangeng and Democrat legislator Angelina Sondakh in the same case.

The KPK questioned Andi as a witness last week and said it planned to eventually call Anas in for questioning. Angelina has been named a suspect in two other bid-rigging cases and implicated in several more.

Surveys & opinion polls

Latest presidential survey has Prabowo out in front

Jakarta Globe - June 8, 2012

Ezra Sihite, Ismira Lutfia & Markus Junianto Sihaloho – Retired Army general Prabowo Subianto has topped a list of likely presidential candidates in a recent study by the Soegeng Sarjadi Syndicate, beating former President Megawati Sukarnoputri and former Vice President Jusuf Kalla.

Prabowo got the vote from 25.8 percent of the 2,192 people surveyed in the study, released by SSS on Wednesday, while Megawati got 22.4 percent.

"This shows that people want change, a new leader and a new direction," Fadli Zon, deputy chairman of the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra), which Prabowo co-founded, said on Wednesday. "This boosts our confidence in stepping into the future."

Kalla came in third with 14.9 percent, defeating fellow Golkar Party politician and chairman Aburizal Bakrie, who garnered just 10.6 percent. Golkar is set to nominate Aburizal as its presidential candidate, despite opposition from other Golkar leaders who support Kalla.

Golkar legislator Rully Chairul Azwar, said the party would not reconsider Aburizal's bid, as people's perceptions about the business tycoon could still change.

"The rational voters are still undecided, so this [survey] cannot serve as a benchmark," he said. "[Kalla and Bakrie] have an equal shot. It all comes down to who makes the better preparations to gather public support."

The SSS survey showed media mogul Surya Paloh in a distant fifth place with just 5.3 percent, while retired general Wiranto, chairman of the People's Conscience Party (Hanura), got 4.5 percent.

The survey also found that voters were drawn more toward nationalist parties than religious ones. "Ideology and party platforms are not the dominant factors for choosing parties," SSS survey coordinator Muhammad Dahlan said.

Fifty-six percent of the people surveyed said they would choose nationalists, while religious parties attracted just 11.5 percent of respondents.

The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), Indonesia's biggest Islam-based party, got only 6.9 percent of the vote, while the other three Islamic-based parties, the National Mandate Party (PAN), the United Development Party (PPP) and the National Awakening Party (PKB), scored less than 3.5 percent each.

Most popular was the nationalist Golkar, which drew 23 percent. The ruling Democratic Party scored 10.7 percent, behind the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) with 19.6 percent.

The survey indicated that only six parties would gain seats at the House of Representatives under the new election law, which requires parties to win 3.5 percent votes for a House seat. The fledgling National Democrat (NasDem) Party was predicted to be one of those meeting the threshold, with 4.8 percent of the vote.

PPP lawmaker Arwani Thomafi questioned the outcome of the study. "We are sure the PPP will get far more votes in 2014 than what the survey suggests," he said.

Political observer and Indonesian Civic Network (LIMA) director Ray Rangkuti said the survey showed that the presidential race was still dominated by "old players." "We need new figures, not the recycled ones," he said. "Old figures should refrain from running for president or vice president in 2014."

Voters seek decisive, firm leadership: Survey

Jakarta Post - June 7, 2012

Jakarta – What traits should one have to become Indonesia's next president? A recent survey revealed that a presidential candidate who is decisive, firm and has strong leadership might be the voters' favorite.

The Soegeng Sarjadi Syndicate (SSS) published its latest survey on Wednesday showing that 22.1 percent of respondents preferred to have a president who was firmly decisive. "Decisive leadership is top of the list of what the country wants," said survey coordinator Muhammad Dahlan.

Other characteristics favored by respondents included "pro-people" (14.3 percent), "honest" (14.1 percent), "leadership ability (13.6 percent) and "intelligence" (12.2 percent).

These preferences may be related to the performance of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Many critics have regularly highlighted his indecisiveness and poor leadership as hindrances in the country's drive to accelerate economic growth and implement bureaucratic reform.

Yudhoyono is constrained by the Constitution from running for a third term in the 2014 election.

As people sought a decisive leader, Prabowo Subianto, a retired three-star general and former chief of the Army's Special Forces (Kopassus), topped the potential candidate list, according to the survey.

Prabowo, founder of the Great Indonesia Movement (Gerindra) Party and former son-in-law of late dictator Soeharto, is preferred by 25.8 percent of respondents.

Trailing behind with 22.4 percent is the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chairwoman Megawati Soekarnoputri, who remains a strong contender for the next elections despite speculation that she may not run as a candidate.

Other favorites include former vice president and Golkar Party politician Jusuf Kalla at 14.9 percent and Golkar chairman Aburizal Bakrie at 10.6 percent.

The survey also showed that the presidential candidate preference did not relate to the political party preferences of the respondents, with Golkar supported by 23 percent of respondents, followed by PDI-P with 19.6 percent, the Democratic Party with 10.7 percent and Gerindra with 10.5 percent.

The survey was conducted between May 14 and 24 in 33 provinces and involved 2,192 respondents.

The survey also revealed that Prabowo would probably be able to secure support in almost all regions excluding Sumatra, where Megawati was 3 percent more popular. Based on several other surveys, Prabowo has secured increasing support to be the next president.

A study by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) published in February, for instance, revealed that 10 percent of respondents supported Megawati, while another 6.7 percent said they would vote for Prabowo. The survey questioned 2,200 respondents in 23 provinces.

A survey by the Indonesian Survey Institute (LSI), published a week after that of the CSIS, showed that Prabowo had overtaken his previously stronger competitor Megawati, winning 39 percent to her 29 percent of respondents' preferences. The LSI queried 2,050 respondents from across the country's 33 provinces for the survey.

"It's very likely that the big support enjoyed by Prabowo is due to people being fed up with the current government, which they regard as having a lack of firmness in taking decisions," CSIS political observer J. Kristiadi said.

"People will simply forget whatever sins he [Prabowo] might have committed in the past as they are driven by frustration," said Kristiadi, hinting at the many allegations against Prabowo of human rights' violations committed before and during the 1998 reform movement to oust Soeharto.

Gerindra deputy chairman Fadli Zon said that the party was happy to learn of the increasing support for Prabowo. "We see this survey as an indicator that people want a new leader with a new course of action," he said. (aml)

Prabowo-JK most favorite presidential candidate pair: Survey

Jakarta Post - June 6, 2012

Jakarta – Great Indonesia Movement (Gerindra) chief Prabowo Subianto and Golkar politician Jusuf Kalla topped a list of 12 hypothetical tickets for the 2014 presidential election, a survey says.

A Prabowo-Kalla ticket was chosen by 14.6 percent of respondents to a Soegeng Sarjadi Syndicate (SSS) released on Wednesday.

Close behind was the hypothetical ticket of former president and Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chairwoman Megawati Soekarnoputri and Kalla, himself a former vice president.

Another popular ticket was Prabowo and Constitutional Court chief justice Mahfud MD, which was backed by 12.4 percent of respondents, the survey said.

Prabowo, a retired three-star general and former commander of the Indonesian Military's Special Forces (Kopassus), was the most popular potential candidate for president in 2014, backed by 25.8 percent of respondents.

"Most respondents said that a firm leader is what the country needs, which was the reason they gave for backing Prabowo," survey coordinator Muhammad Dahlan said.

Others favorite candidates for president were Megawati, backed by 22.4 percent of respondents; Kalla, at 14.9 percent; and Golkar chairman Aburizal Bakrie.

Kalla and Constitutional Court chief justice Mohammad Mahfud MD were the most popular potential vice presidential candidates, backed by 18.7 percent and 16 percent of respondents, respectively.

Other names touted for the nation's No. 2 spot were State-Owned Enterprises Minister Dahlan Iskan, who was backed by 13.8 percent of respondents, Coordinating Economic Minister Hatta Rajasa (11.3 percent) and Yogyakarta Governor Sri Sultan Hamengkubuwono XI (11 percent).

The survey was conducted between May 14 and 24 in 33 provinces and involved 2,192 respondents. (aml)

Indonesia becomes 'more intolerant'

Jakarta Post - June 6, 2012

Jakarta – A new survey published on Tuesday has once again confirmed the widely held assumption that religious intolerance is rising in the country.

The survey, conducted by the Jakarta-based think tank Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) between Jan. 16 and 24 this year, found that although 83.4 percent of the respondents said that they had no problem with neighbors from different ethnic groups, 79.3 percent objected to inter-religious marriage.

The survey also found that 68.2 percent of respondents refused to allow people of different faiths to build places of worship in their neighborhood.

Of the total 2,220 respondents interviewed in 23 provinces, 91.5 percent said that people from different faiths must get approval from the local community before they could build a place of worship. The survey's sample represents the plurality of the country's population.

Close to 80 percent of respondents also thought that all restaurants and eateries should shut down during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

Most of the respondents in the survey also registered low levels of trust towards people of different faiths. More than 25 percent of the respondents said that they would not trust subscribers of different faiths, while 60 percent said that "they would be on guard".

The survey also found that religious intolerance spread across party lines. "No difference was seen between nationalist and Islamic party supporters. This means that party ideology, especially that of the nationalist parties, had failed to strike a chord with their supporters," CSIS' political and international relations director, Philips J. Vermonte, said at a press briefing.

A significant number of respondents also supported piety-oriented ordinances. Close to 65 percent of respondents said they would approve a policy that would require female students to wear Muslim headscarves, while 61 percent of them would agree to an ordinance that would mandate students to be fluent in Arabic.

Philips said that the survey indicates that there was only little that the country gained in terms of religious harmony in the years after the downfall of the New Order regime.

"In spite of advances in democratization in the country after the fall of New Order regime, marked by three general elections in 14 years, there's still a gap between political freedom and religious tolerance in daily life," he said.

Philips said that the survey also challenged conventional wisdom that the government was the only party to blame for rising intolerance. "The government is of course the one that should be responsible for promoting tolerance. But this survey shows that the problem lies also with society," he said.

Contacted separately, Deputy Religious Affairs Minister Nasaruddin Umar acknowledged that there was indeed a trend towards religious intolerance, but he regretted the fact that CSIS released its findings, given that it could cause more trouble in the community.

"This will awaken the sleeping tiger," he told The Jakarta Post. Nasaruddin said that the world could get the wrong impression that the country's majority Muslim population is responsible for the rise in intolerance.

Against this trend, Nasaruddin said that the ministry would step up its campaign to curb intolerance. "For instance we will keep an a close eye on books used in the [educational] curriculum. We will not tolerate any books that provoke religious conflicts," he said.

University of Indonesia psychologist Ratih Ibrahim attributed rising intolerance to actions of groups and individuals who tried to benefit from communal conflicts. "These parties seek certain gains, including political ones, by messing with our social harmony," she said.

She said that if the trend continued, Indonesia could soon lose its bragging rights as a diverse nation. "We tell the world that we respect other religions and cultures, but the fact is that some groups are more dominant and we are now on the verge of a lawless society in spite of the fact that religion now plays a greater role," she said. (asa/tas/aml)

Labour & migrant workers

Indonesian maids arrive in Malaysia after ban

Agence France Presse - June 3, 2012

Indonesia has resumed sending maids to work in Malaysia three years after a ban was enforced because of numerous abuse cases, but fewer than a third of them had arrived, according to a report.

Indonesia, the main provider of domestic workers for Malaysia, announced last December it would lift the ban after the two countries agreed to better protect maids, including allowing them one day off per week.

The ban was imposed by Jakarta in June 2009 after numerous abuse cases and has been a sore point in relations between the two Southeast Asian neighbours.

A Malaysian labour recruitment official said while the number that arrived four days ago was small, it was "better than nothing."

"We managed to bring only 29 maids as many had backed out because of the bureaucracy in the Indonesian recruitment system," Jeffrey Foo, president of the Malaysian Association of Foreign Maid Agencies was quoted as saying by the New Sunday Times newspaper.

But Suryana Sastradiredja, a social and cultural affairs official at the Indonesian embassy in Kuala Lumpur, said he had no idea why the turnout had been so low but indicated that it could be due to fear of abuse.

"Perhaps the salary is too low, or after hearing of abuse cases, they backed out. I do not know the real reason behind this," he said.

It was reported earlier that up to 5,000 maids would arrive monthly after the ban was lifted. Indonesian maids receive about 600 ringgit ($188) a month but often work from sunrise to sundown daily. They attend to the elderly, children and cook meals.

Before the ban was enforced some 300,000 Indonesian women worked in Malaysian households. The ban led to a shortage of maids that affected the daily routine of many working Malaysian parents.

Cambodia also imposed a ban on sending domestic workers to Malaysia last October following numerous abuse complaints.

Health & education

'Vasectomies have always been haram': MUI

Jakarta Post - June 6, 2012

Jakarta – The head of the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) says the council has always held that vasectomies and tubectomies were not allowed under Islamic law.

MUI chairman Amidhan said on Wednesday that the clerics had issued edicts (fatwa) banning the use of the procedures after several reviews between 1979 and 2009.

"In 2009, the ulema council reviewed vasectomies and tubectomies during a congress in Padangpanjang, West Sumatra. We concluded that both practices were haram," he told The Jakarta Post, meaning the procedures were forbidden by Islamic law.

According to Amidhan, the ulemas' fears that procedures could not be reversed wee behind the rejection.

The National Family Planning Agency (BKKBN) previously urged the MUI to issue a fatwa declaring that contraception and vasectomies were allowed under Islamic law to encourage Indonesian men to participate in family planning programs. (asa)

UI students want transparency

Jakarta Post - June 5, 2012

Jakarta – Representatives of the University of Indonesia's student executive body (BEM UI) rallied at a train station near their campus in Depok, West Java, to protest the alleged mismanagement of the university's finances.

The Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) released a financial audit of the university in January that alleged that the university lost Rp 41 billion (US$451,417) in state money.

"It's a matter of transparency, of explaining where our tuition money goes," BEM UI head Faldo Maldini said on Monday as quoted by kompas.com.

As part of the protest, students erected a sign at the train station reading: "There's a much bigger problem at UI right now than these signs".

Some BEM UI members remained at the scene to protect the sign, fearing that campus officials might take it down.

"This action is being taken to remind the UI community about corruption cases and governance issues at the university that remain unresolved," Faldo said.

Targeting the tobacco industry's influence in Indonesia

Jakarta Globe - June 2, 2012

Dessy Sagita – Indonesia's weak regulations on cigarette sales and advertising make it the last remaining haven for the international tobacco industry, says a consumer protection activist marking World No Tobacco Day.

Tulus Abadi, manager of the Indonesian Consumer Protection Foundation (YLKI), pointed out on Wednesday that although China and India had more smokers than Indonesia, the latter was the only country in the Asia-Pacific region not to have ratified the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

That lumps Indonesia in a group of just 11 countries, alongside Somalia and Zimbabwe, that have not ratified the FCTC.

This, Tulus said, was because the country's powerful tobacco lobby was hard at work undermining the government's tobacco control policies.

"Take, for instance, Government Regulation No. 81 of 1999," he said. "That contained quite a spectacular clause, one that banned tobacco advertising on electronic media."

The regulation was issued by Farid Anfasa Moeloek, the health minister under President B.J. Habibie and a prominent tobacco-control activist. It was maintained under President Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid, but promptly repealed when Megawati Sukarnoputri became president.

Tulus said other indications of the tobacco industry's interference could be seen in the omission of nicotine from a list of addictive substances in the 1992 Health Law; in constitutional reviews filed against regional bylaws on smoking-free zones; and in delays to the planned issuance of a government regulation on tobacco control.

The theme for this year's World No Tobacco Day, which falls today, is Tobacco Industry Interference. The WHO says the campaign "will focus on the need to expose and counter the tobacco industry's brazen and increasingly aggressive attempts to undermine the FCTC because of the serious danger they pose to public health."

"The tobacco industry has used its economic power, lobbying and marketing machinery, and manipulation of the media to discredit scientific research and influence governments in order to propagate the sale and distribution of its deadly product," the organization says.

"Furthermore, the tobacco industry continues to inject large philanthropic contributions into social programs worldwide to create a positive public image under the guise of corporate social responsibility."

Samlee Plianbangchang, director of the WHO's Southeast Asia region, said in a statement released on Wednesday that governments in the region needed to do more to tackle this interference, particularly in light of the marketing methods being employed by the tobacco industry.

One in 10 schoolchildren in the region is offered free tobacco products, he said, while in some countries tobacco companies are suing governments over restrictions on cigarette packaging, on the grounds that their freedom of expression is being violated.

Tulus said there are other more subtle ways that the industry gets its message across, including via corporate social responsibility programs and scholarships.

He argued that as a "harmful industry," big tobacco should not be allowed to carry out CSR programs. CSR, he said, was meant to show a company's responsibility to the local people and one of its key values was compliance with the law.

"But we all know that the tobacco industry is the least compliant when it comes to the regulations," Tulus said.

Arist Merdeka Sirait, chairman of the National Commission for Child Protection (Komnas Anak), said that while he was not opposed to tobacco companies doing CSR, he objected to use of their brands in the programs.

"If they are sincere in helping others, people don't have to know that the help came from a cigarette company," he said.

He argued that CSR, charity work or scholarships from big tobacco were no different from advertisements.

"If [the brands] continue to be mentioned, it will be planted in our children's minds that cigarette companies are good."

But Hasan Aoni Aziz Us, from the Association of Indonesian Cigarette Producers (Gappri), said tobacco companies should not be discouraged from doing valuable work through CSR.

"Every year, there is never enough funding from the state budget or regional budget for development," he said recently. "Cigarette companies help fill that hole."

Disability rights

For Indonesians with disabilities, finally an opportunity to thrive

Jakarta Globe - June 5, 2012

Ulma Haryanto & Anita Rachman – In November 2011, the House of Representatives ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities, four years after the country became a signatory. Indonesia was among the first 83 countries to sign the convention.

Gufroni Sakaril, chairman of the Indonesian Disabled Association (PPCI), said the ratification provided a foundation to revise the outdated 1997 Law on People with Disabilities.

"The new law should be rights-oriented and view people with disabilities as the subject, not an object of government charity programs like the previous law," Gufroni said.

This change of perspective is important, he said, to enable the active participation of people living with disabilities.

"No more looking at a disabled person and thinking that they cannot live on their own without help from others," Gufroni said. "With the proper facilities they can, and be productive."

Saharuddin Daming, a member of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) who was part of the team that drafted the new law, said the four-year gap between the ratification and the signing was fast for Indonesian standards.

However, he added, there is still a long way to go until a proper system and the desired social changes take place.

A 2010 study by the Social Affairs Ministry showed that there were around 2.1 million people in the country living with disabilities. At least 2 percent, or about 51,000 of them, live in Jakarta.

Those in the capital who are neglected or come from low-income families are put under the watch of Jakarta's Social Affairs Office. According to annual surveys conducted by the office, 11,904 people last year received government aid and free training, including the 2,381 who reside in state- run housing facilities, which officially only have a capacity to shelter 1,184, and another 747 who are categorized as severely disabled and receive a monthly allowance of Rp 300,000 ($32).

Aria Indrawati, from the Mitra Netra Foundation for the blind, said state- run training and education programs had not changed much over the years.

Sri Utami, head of the elderly and disabled division at Jakarta's Social Affairs Office, said computer training for the blind was only recently introduced at several government training centers.

"We focus more on skills that can help the disabled to live and work independently," Sri said. "Now apart from regular massages, we also provide shiatsu training."

But Aria said this kind of training was not what was needed. "A blind person is trained to be a masseur or a musician. It's the same with other disabilities. This indirectly helps preserve the stereotype that this is all that disabled people can do."

For people with disabilities, the biggest handicap is not their physical condition, said Gufroni who was born with a condition that stunted the growth of both arms.

"The sense that we are inferior is the biggest handicap," he said. "It imposes limits and builds social boundaries." Despite his condition, Gufroni attended regular schools, enduring taunts from others. "It made me stronger," he said.

Social stigma

Like many who are visually impaired, Sugiyo, 43, had little choice but to learn how to be a masseur after high school.

"I came to Jakarta in 1989. I wanted to be able to support myself so I took a massage course," Sugiyo said. "At the time, the only job a blind man could find was being a masseur. There were no choices."

Born in Kebumen, Central Java, Sugiyo lost his sight when he was 3-years- old because of malnutrition. His parents kept him out of school because of his disability. When he was 10, they died and Sugiyo enrolled in a state- run boarding school for the blind in Temanggung so he would not be a burden to his siblings.

Had he not been introduced to the Mitra Netra Foundation, Sugiyo probably would have never had the confidence or the skills to write 10 computer manuals for the blind. "The foundation started computer training for the blind in 1992, and Sugiyo was one of our first students," Aria said.

Through the foundation, Sugiyo pursued a newfound interest in foreign languages. He learned English and later took more computer workshops abroad before becoming a trainer at the foundation.

"Very few people with disabilities come from families that believe that they can do things like normal people," Aria said.

She added that even though she had impaired vision, she and her family were convinced she could study in a normal school. "I had to pay people to read books to me because there were few books in braille and [computer] programs that converted text to speech were unheard of," she said.

Widespread beliefs linking disabilities to past sins or bad karma also help bring shame to some families.

"In our surveys, not all family members admit to having a relative with disabilities," said the Jakarta Social Office's Sri. "This limits the effectiveness of our programs because we cannot allocate resources."

Breaking barriers

Since its establishment in 1991, Mitra Netra Foundation's aim has been to provide assistance to the blind. "We provide education, work, training material in braille, audio books, computer training as well as advocacy," Aria said.

The foundation was among the first to provide computer training for blind people and is active in lobbying companies to hire more disabled people. "It is very hard to convince them. It took us a year to lobby [an Indonesian conglomerate] to hire two blind people as phone operators," she said. Gufroni said his association was campaigning for an inclusive community.

"First we need to change the mind-set of people living with disabilities and society, starting from using the term 'penyandang disabilitas' [people with disabilities] instead of the more common 'penyandang cacat' [people with deformities]," he said.

"An inclusive society means that people with disabilities are involved and considered in all aspects of life," he said. "Because once people with disabilities are accommodated, so is everyone."

Gufroni also said more political will was needed from the government. "People with disabilities are not the responsibility of only the Social Affairs Ministry but also other ministries such as legal and human rights, transportation, manpower and transmigration, education, even defense and security," he said.

Komnas HAM's Saharuddin said the establishment of a national commission to oversee this kind of coordination as well as to monitor compliance would be regulated in the new law. "We hope that before the end of the year we can submit a draft to the Social Affairs Ministry before forwarding it to the House," he added.

Refugees & asylum seekers

Police arrest 47 Afghan asylum seekers attempting Australia crossing

Jakarta Globe - June 4, 2012

Forty-seven Afghan asylum seekers were arrested by police in Sukabumi, West Java, on Sunday as they allegedly attempted to sail to Australia's Christmas Island, police told the Antara news agency.

"We caught the 47 illegal immigrants as they were trying to cross to Australia," Adj. Comr. Sumaryoto, head of the Ciemas subdistrict police, told Antara. "They had been transported by two medium trucks from Cisarua in Bogor."

The asylum seekers had been tailed by police since Bagbagan, near the coastal town of Pelabuhan Ratu, as they headed to Ciemas, Sumaryoto said. Some of the men allegedly tried to flee when police pulled the trucks over near Girimukti village. All have been held at the Ciemas subdistrict police station as the investigation continues.

"We are still investigating this sending of illegal immigrants to Sukabumi's waters," Sumaryoto said according to Antara.

The coast around Ciemas is popular with smugglers because of its close proximity to Christmas Island. Asylum seekers, mostly from Afghanistan and Iran, brave the treacherous 236 mile journey to Christmas Island with the hopes of gaining refugee status in Australia. Many are detained in Indonesia, a popular stepping stone for Asian asylum seekers attempting to cross to Australia.

Local police say they have been increasing patrols of the area, relying on tips from local residents. "We have also been coordinating with local fishermen," Sumaryoto said. "In the past, arrests were the result of reports from local residents who suspected groups of foreigners staying near the beach."

Graft & corruption

Sentences of officials responsible for Mahakam collapse draw criticism

Jakarta Globe - June 8, 2012

Tunggadewa Mattangkilang, Kutai Kartanegara, East Kalimantan. The three officials charged with criminal negligence leading to the deadly collapse of the Mahakam II Bridge here in November were on Wednesday convicted and sentenced to a year in jail.

The sentence handed down by the court in Tenggarong, the capital of Kutai Kartanegara district, was lighter than the 20 months that prosecutors had sought. The charges themselves carried a maximum sentence of five years.

The defendants – Setiono, the district official in charge of maintaining the suspension bridge; Yoyo Suryana, the official responsible for the maintenance funds; and Muhammad Syahrial Fahrurrozi, the engineering chief at Bukaka Teknik Utama, the company contracted to maintain the bridge – were all found guilty of criminal oversight leading to the deadly accident on Nov. 26 in which at least 24 people were killed.

Hasanudin Nasution, a lawyer for Setiono and Yoyo, both from the Kutai Kartanegara Public Works Office, called the trial unfair and said his clients would appeal the verdict.

"Why have the district head and the head of the public works office not been touched?" he asked after the hearing. "The district head wasn't even among the more than 60 witnesses questioned. What's going on here? I believe my clients were sacrificed for those higher up."

Relatives of those killed in the incident also expressed dissatisfaction with the verdict, but for a different reason.

"The length of the sentence is very disappointing," said one family member who declined to be identified. "This was a case of negligence, for which they should have gotten five years."

Twenty-four people were confirmed dead when the 10-year-old bridge over the Mahakam River collapsed. Fourteen remain missing and are presumed dead, while 39 people were injured.

More lawmakers point at Anas over Hambalang

Jakarta Post - June 8, 2012

Margareth S. Aritonang and Ina Parlina, Jakarta – Former Democratic Party treasurer Muhammad Nazaruddin is not the only person implicating party chairman Anas Urbaningrum in the scandal surrounding the construction of a sports facility in Hambalang, West Java.

House of Representatives (DPR) lawmakers Ignatius Mulyono and Zulfadhli have also alleged that Anas' had a role in graft surrounding the Rp 1.52 trillion (US$162.64) construction project.

Zulfadhli, who sits on House Commission X overseeing sports, said that Anas was intensively involved in budget deliberations for the project when he was a Commission X lawmaker before becoming party chairman in 2010.

"Most of the Commission's members attended meetings to discuss the budget for the construction project. I remember that Anas was among the participants," Zulfadhli told reporters on the sidelines of a hearing with Youth and Sports Minister Andi Mallarangeng on Thursday.

According to Zulfadhli, one of the most difficult discussions regarding the Hambalang project was on obtaining its land certificate. Zulfadhli, a Golkar lawmaker, declined to specify whether Anas had a hand in issuing the certificate.

Mulyono previously claimed that Anas once asked him to contact the National Land Agency (BPN) head Joyo Winoto for an update on the land clearance process for the construction site.

According to Mulyono, Anas, in his capacity as the leader of the Democratic Party in the House at the time of the deliberations, also asked him to ask the Youth and Sports Ministry why the issuance of the certificate had been delayed.

Mulyono alleged that he never spoke to Joyo, claiming that he learned that the titles for the new sports complex were ready three weeks later. Andi, who is also a Democratic Party politician, said that he had no knowledge of the involvement of people outside of the ministry in arranging the land clearances.

"Only people at the ministry were involved in arranging the clearance since the very beginning of process in 2004. Not even one outsider that I know of interfered in the process," Andi said after the hearing on Thursday.

Anas' involvement in the Hambalang project was first alleged by Nazaruddin, currently incarcerated for a conviction in an unrelated graft scandal.

The complexity of the issue, as well as the many parties allegedly involved in the project, has prompted one House lawmaker to call for a special committee to investigate.

"We will do our best to finish the complicated matter. We plan to summon other relevant ministries, such as the Public Works Ministry. However, we are considering establishing a special committee for further investigation unless we fail to reach a solution due to the complexity of the matter," Agus Hermanto, who chairs another committee studying fraud in the project, said.

Nazaruddin recently accused Anas of spending bribe money that Anas received to fund campaign material for his bid to lead the Democratic Party at its congress in 2010.

Separately, Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) spokesman Johan Budi said all witnesses related to the graft scandal would be summoned for questioning. "Of course, we will investigate any information and actors in this case," Johan said on Wednesday.

Three jailed over deadly Kalimantan bridge collapse

Jakarta Globe - June 6, 2012

Kutai Kartanegara, East Kalimantan – A panel of judges sentenced three men responsible for the maintenance of the Kutai Kartanegara bridge to one year in jail after the span collapsed late last year, killing 22 people.

Kutai Kartanegara's infrastructure chief Yoyok Suriana, Setiono, the project's technician, and Muhammad Syahrial Fahrurrozi, of the Bukaka Teknik Utama construction company, all failed to ensure the crossing was properly maintained, the Kutai Kartanegara District Court ruled.

The Kutai Kartanegara bridge, which spanned across Mahakam River, collapsed on Nov. 26, 2011. At least 22 people died and 39 were injured in the collapse. An additional 14 people were declared missing.

The panel of judges, presided over by Ni Putu Indayani, declared the men guilty of negligence that resulted in the loss of life. The defendants were ordered to pay Rp 25,000 ($3) each in trial fees.

The sentence was lower than the one year, eight months sought by the prosecution. Yoyok accepted the verdict.

Setiono, Syahrial said they were considering filing an appeal. "The heads of the Kutai Kartanegara district and the public work agency should also be held responsible for the bridge collapse," Yoyok's and Setyono's lawyer, Hasanuddin Nasution, added. (Antara/JG)

Politics responsible for graft at SOEs: KPK

Jakarta Post - June 5, 2012

Ina Parlina, Jakarta – The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) blamed politics for the absence of a deterrent effect that should have resulted from the sentencing of state-owned enterprise managers.

Busyro Muqoddas, KPK deputy chairman for prevention unit, said that the reason so many state-owned enterprises and those owned by local administrations are entangled in graft was because they "are compromised by politicians from certain political parties".

"Eventually, these government projects, which are supposed to be fair and clean, must deal with political interests," Busyro said on Monday.

Busyro was speaking at a discussion organized by the KPK. He said that many of these enterprises eventually subcontracted the projects they won to "incompetent companies, particularly troubled ones affiliated with certain political parties."

Busyro urged State-Owned Enterprises Minister Dahlan Iskan, who was also a panel member in the discussion, to design a specific regulation that could protect SOEs from such political interests.

Dahlan refused to take the blame, saying that it was the SOEs and not his office, which should take responsibility for graft problems.

"As long as the bidding process does not prohibit such sub-contracting practices, essentially it is allowed," he said. "So, the key [to having a clean bidding process] is not the contractors, but the project owners because they are the ones who control the process."

Dahlan, however, admitted that a limited internal survey showed that 70 percent of state-owned construction companies were offered fees to win government projects.

Busyro revealed that between 2008 and 2012 his office often dealt with cases implicating SOEs, including two recent cases being investigated by the KPK; the construction of sports facilities for upcoming national games (PON) in Riau which implicated an official from state-owned housing company PT Pembangunan Perumahan, and Hambalang sports complex, which implicated state-owned construction companies PT Adhi Karya and PT Wijaya Karya.

Adhi Karya and Wijaya Karya allegedly sub-contracted the Hambalang project to several private companies, including PT Dutasari Citralaras, in which Athiyyah Laila, the wife of Democratic Party chairman Anas Urbaningrum, once was commissioner.

Bambang Widjojanto, KPK deputy chairman for the prosecution unit, pledged that he would implicate Dutasari in the case. "We are also concentrating on the subcontracting problem," he said on the sidelines of the discussion.

At least seven SOE executives have been convicted in KPK cases, including Eddie Widiono Suwondho, former president director of state electricity company PT PLN; Washington Mampe Parulian Simanjuntak, former president director of state-owned gas company PT Perusahaan Gas Negara; Trijono, former general manager of PGN East Java; Djoko Pramono, former PGN director for general affairs and human resources; Gunawan Pranoto, former president director of state-owned pharmaceutical company PT Kimia Farma; Budiarto Maliang, former commissioner of PT Kimia Farma Trading and Distribution; and Ranendra Dangin, former financial director of state agribusiness firm PT Rajawali Nusantara Indonesia (RNI).

In December last year Eddie was sentenced to five years in prison for ordering the direct appointment of PT Netway Utama as bid winner in an outsourcing project between PLN and the company.

Eddie's order to directly appoint Netway without an appropriate bid to handle the 2004-2006 PLN procurement outsourcing project of a computerized customer information system (CIS-RISI) in Jakarta and Tangerang was proven to have caused Rp 46 billion in state losses.

As the longest-serving PLN president director, from 2001 until 2008, Eddie is known to have close ties with the inner-circles of former president Megawati Soekarnoputri and former vice president Jusuf Kalla.

KPK locks up Miranda

Jakarta Post - June 2, 2012

Ina Parlina, Jakarta – The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) on Friday detained Miranda S. Goeltom after questioning the former Bank Indonesia top official for more than seven hours.

Miranda, a high town socialite, was escorted to the detention cell in the basement of the antigraft body's compound. She will be locked up for the next 20 days.

"I will be cooperative. I hope the KPK will process my case quickly so that I get my legal status soon," she said as she was transferred to her cell.

Miranda was the latest individual to be prosecuted in connection to the 2004 vote-buying case during her election as Bank Indonesia senior deputy governor at the House of Representatives.

As many as 28 lawmakers had been convicted of taking bribes in the election. They have mostly completed their prison terms.

Businesswoman Nunun Nurbaeti, who acted as a mediator between Miranda and the lawmakers, was sent to jail for two-and-a-half years. Many saw the sentence as too lenient for a crook who had tried to evade justice by fleeing overseas for months.

KPK deputy chairman Bambang Widjojanto, said Miranda's incarceration was a step that hopefully could facilitate further investigation.

Yet, he later admitted that "until Friday the investigators still found no evidence that can be used as a basis to hunt down other actors, including the prime benefactor in the case". "Right now, the KPK is focusing on Miranda's role," Bambang said.

The KPK first investigated the case in early 2009, following a confession by former Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) lawmaker Agus Condro Prayitno in late 2008. According to Agus, he and other lawmakers with the House's finance commission accepted a number of traveler's checks to swing votes for Miranda.

Previous court proceedings have revealed that Nunun's subordinate Arie Malangjudo distributed checks worth Rp 20.85 billion to dozens of lawmakers upon Nunun's order on June 8. 2004.

The court has also revealed that the Rp 20.85 billion checks were indeed parts of a total of Rp 24 billion checks bought from Bank Internasional Indonesia (BII) by First Mujur using Bank Artha Graha money earlier on the same day.

The paper trail went cold as Ferry Yen, who many believed could reveal how the same checks found their way into lawmakers' pockets, died in 2007.

"Of course it [is the missing link and] is a part of our investigation," Bambang said. "But now, Miranda is our focus. Just wait until we have enough evidence to pin other actors, including those who benefited from her winning. We will reveal it."

Miranda was named a suspect in late January and faces a maximum five-year prison term and a Rp 250 million fine for bribery or a maximum of three years in prison and a Rp 150 million fine for paying illegal commissions.

Miranda will be detained at the new block, joining the two female inmates there, graft suspect Angelina Sondakh and convict Mindo "Rosa" Rosalina Manulang.

Andi Simangunsong, Miranda's lawyer, said that his team would soon to file a request to postpone her detention.

Agus Condro – who has also been convicted – repeatedly said that Miranda was but a part of a larger game at play and that the amount of bribes paid for her selection for advancement within the central bank would have fallen well short of her senior deputy director's salary for her entire 5-year term.

Emerson Yuntho of the Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) said it would be a major failure if the KPK could not nail the prime benefactor in the bribery scheme. He said the previous court proceedings have failed to reveal who the benefactor was. The trials, however, have shown that neither Nunun, nor Miranda is the benefactor," Emerson said.

Miranda's time line

June 8, 2004: Miranda S. Goeltom is named Bank Indonesia senior deputy governor.

Aug. 15, 2008: Lawmaker Agus Condro confesses to accepting Rp 500 million in traveler's checks after voting for Miranda's appointment.

Sept. 7, 2008: The KPK receives a report from the PPATK of 400 traveler's checks that were allegedly given to lawmakers to appoint Miranda.

Jan. 26, 2012: Miranda is named a suspect by the KPK in the vote-buying scandal.

Parties involved in the case:

28 lawmakers have been sentenced to prison for terms ranging from 15 to 30 months for accepting bribes to back Miranda.

Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P): 13 lawmakers
Golkar: 11 lawmakers
PPP: 3 lawmakers
Military/Police: 1 lawmaker

Nunun Nurbaeti was sentenced to two-and-a-half years' imprisonment for disbursing the bribes to lawmakers.

BPK finds trillions of rupiah in state budget discrepancies

Jakarta Globe - June 2, 2012

Arientha Primanita – An audit of government financial reports has identified hundreds of trillions of rupiah from the 2011 state budget still unaccounted for.

The results of the audit by the State Audit Agency (BPK) will likely be utilized by opposition parties to attack President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's administration and could also prompt legal enforcers to investigate the discrepancies.

The audit results have prompted Yudhoyono to warn all ministries and officials to make sure all the state money was used efficiently and was not stolen.

"State money should not be embezzled and what belongs to the state must be put inside the state's coffers," he told a press briefing after receiving BPK chief Hadi Purnomo at the State Palace in Jakarta on Wednesday.

The president said he invited all his ministers to the meeting so that they could listen directly to what Hadi said they should do to fix the problems in their financial reports.

The BPK gave only 67 out of 87 ministries and state institutions unqualified opinions, meaning there were no problems in their report. The others received qualified opinions, indicating that some state money was unaccounted for in the audit.

Hadi said his office's audit has found at least two problems in fixed assets valuations in many ministries when considering the former assets of the now-defunct National Banking Restructuring Board (BPPN).

First, the audit found discrepancies between the value of fixed assets recorded in the reports and the BPK's valuations.

The BPK found Rp 4.13 trillion ($438 million) in discrepancies across 10 ministries and institutions. In addition, in the Public Works Ministry, the audit found Rp 109 trillion in discrepancies.

The audit also found Rp 3.88 trillion awry in three ministries while in 40 ministries and institutions, the audit found Rp 1.54 trillion in discrepancies.

The BPK also cannot verify Rp 6.89 trillion recorded in the financial reports of 14 ministries and institutions as they could not find the fixed assets to which the reports referred.

Regarding BPPN's cashier checks, which have been reported to be worth Rp 18.25 trillion and Rp 11.18 trillion respectively, the BPK could not find the supporting documents.

Hadi, however, said that in the last eight years the government has gradually increased the quality of its financial reports.

The government, he said, had reported an income of Rp 1,211 trillion and an expense of Rp 1,295 trillion in 2011.

"State income increased by Rp 216 trillion or 22 percent compared to 2010, when it stood at Rp 995 trillion," Hadi said.

Yudhoyono, meanwhile, said that ministries and institutions should fix their official travel systems so that they don't waste state money.

According to the BPK audit, several ministries duplicate travel expense records while many trips were not supported with documentation.

"We found unaccountable trips in 28 ministries, worth Rp 29.32 billion and $150,000," he said.

Yudhoyono ordered his ministers to investigate all discrepancies reported by the BPK, lauding the audit agency for helping the government prevent corruption and embezzlement of the public's money.

[Additional reporting from Antara.]

Indonesia's KPK widens scope of investigation into Angelina

Jakarta Globe - June 1, 2012

Rizky Amelia – Antigraft officials have questioned several witnesses in connection to the corruption charges against Angelina Sondakh as they ramp up their investigation into the Democratic Party legislator.

Muhammad Nazaruddin, the former Democratic treasurer and the one who implicated Angelina in a raft of bid-rigging cases, was grilled for the second time about Angelina by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK).

Priharsa Nugraha, a KPK spokesman, confirmed that Nazaruddin was questioned as a witness against Angelina, who has been arrested and charged in two cases of corruption.

Nazaruddin was convicted and jailed earlier this year for rigging the tender for the construction of the athletes' village for the Southeast Asian Games.

Angelina has been charged in the same case, as well as for bid-rigging in the project to build the Hambalang sports center in Sentul, Bogor.

Priharsa said the KPK was also expanding its investigation into other cases in which Angelina has been implicated, including in procurement projects for the Education Ministry.

Dadang Sudiyarto, the head of the ministry's budget office, was questioned later on Thursday. The procurement project involved 16 state universities and Rp 600 billion ($63.6 million) in public funds.

At the time of the alleged offenses, Angelina was a member of the House of Representatives Budget Committee, which approves allocations of the state budget. She was also a member of House Commission X, which oversees sports affairs.

Priharsa said her role on the Budget Committee, which has come under public scrutiny for allegations of budget-fixing, was also being looked into by the KPK.

He said that one of the other witnesses questioned on Thursday was Nining Indra Saleh, the House secretary general, who was called in about Angelina's work on the Budget Committee.

Tama Satrya Langkun, a researcher with Indonesia Corruption Watch, said Nining's questioning should yield valuable leads for the KPK investigators. "There should be many things the KPK can get from questioning the secretary general because she must know about many deals involving legislators," he said.

However, Nining denied knowing anything about the cases in which Angelina was charged. "I don't know. I'm just the House secretary general," she said. She added that she had handed over 25 documents to the KPK as evidence, including a copy of the letter appointing Angelina to the Budget Committee.

Angelina, a former Miss Indonesia and Democrat deputy secretary general, was questioned by the KPK a day earlier.

Her lawyer, Teuku Nasrullah, said his client faced 21 questions from the KPK, but added that they were only related to the decision-making process at the House. "The questions did not touch on any specific projects," Nasrullah said.

He said his client was ready to answer questions on the Hambalang complex if the KPK asked her. "My client will cooperate fully with the KPK," Nasrullah said.

Antigraft activists have called on Angelina to cooperate with the KPK to go after the higher officials implicated in the cases, including Youth and Sports Minister Andi Mallarangeng and Democratic Party chairman Anas Urbaningrum.

Hard-line & vigilante groups

Police shield shop with liquor from FPI mob

Jakarta Globe - June 2, 2012

Amid rising public criticism that the police are being weak against hard- liners such as the Islamic Defenders Front, the force took action and prevented the radical group from destroying shops selling alcoholic beverages in Garut, West Java, on Tuesday evening.

Members of the FPI banged on the door of the shop in Garut and tried to break it down, but police soon arrived and threatened to arrest anyone trying to force their way in, Antara news agency reported on Wednesday.

"Arrest anyone who resorts to violence," Garut Police deputy chief Comr. Legawa Utama told his officers, according to Antara. Several police officers immediately secured the building.

The FPI mob said they were willing to withdraw but demanded that the police confiscate the alcoholic beverages being sold by the shop. The police denied the request, arguing that they could not forcefully break into the shop without an official warrant.

The shop's owner finally opened the door, allowing the police and a representative of the FPI to enter. Police then confiscated some bottles of alcoholic beverages from the shop, and the FPI mob dispersed into the night.

It is illegal in Indonesia to sell liquor stronger than 5 percent alcohol outside of select businesses such as hotels, restaurants, nightclubs and duty-free shops. Beer can be sold anywhere.

The move came on the heels of a raid by FPI members on a warehouse in Garut on Monday evening. The mob forced its way in and destroyed thousands of bottles of alcoholic drinks.

International Crisis Group analyst Sidney Jones said recently that groups such as the FPI were becoming increasingly confident in their push to get Islamic laws accepted by the mainstream, following a series of successful campaigns.

FPI denounces criminal element within organization

Jakarta Globe - June 2, 2012

Ulin Yusron & Ardi Mandiri – A high-level member of the hard-line Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) said on Saturday that the organization was having a difficult time controlling some of its "wayward members," some of whom were thugs that went against the principles of group.

Habib Salim, head of the FPI's Jakarta chapter, told BeritaSatu that the FPI denounced practices like demanding "haram levies" from nightclubs, even though some of its members were known to do such things. The FPI actually considered those practices as haram, or forbidden under Islamic law.

"We have many such people in the FPI," Salim said. "We've had problems dealing with them because we have so many members."

If any of these people claimed they were acting on behalf of FPI chairman Habib Rizieq, he said, it wasn't true. "Across Jakarta there are wayward members who abuse the big name of FPI," he said.

Salim attributed the problem to the fact that many members were indeed former criminals who had supposedly repented their past behavior. "We've guided them to the right way," he said. "But apparently, in the middle of the way they've gone astray again. We must work hard to take them back to the right way."

The FPI had kicked out some of its members who had tried to get levies from nightclubs, he said. "Since I was appointed the head of the Jakarta chapter, I have fired dozens of FPI clerics," Salim said. (BeritaSatu/JG)

Freedom of religion & worship

Indonesia may not have 'silent majority'

Jakarta Post - June 7, 2012

Jakarta – Increasing religious intolerance as documented in a recent survey should be blamed on official indecisiveness in confronting hostile radical groups, an activist has said.

"Some surveys show that, in fact, there's no 'silent majority' that supports pluralism. The majority of Indonesian people probably still practice religious intolerance," Wahid Institute director Zannuba "Yenny" Wahid said on Wednesday.

Radical groups condoned by the authorities have affected how communities understand pluralism and religious difference, she added. "Increasing intolerance is most likely carried out by radical groups that will eventually spread intolerance in society. They also question pluralism," Yenny said.

Yenny was commenting on a report released by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) that showed intolerance was on the rise in Indonesia.

According to the survey, 68.2 percent of respondents did not want people from different faiths to build places of worship in their neighborhoods. The survey also found that while 83.4 percent of respondents claimed that they would accept neighbors from a different ethnic group, 79.3 percent objected interreligious marriage.

Yenny, the daughter of late president Abdurrahman Wahid and a campaigner for pluralism, said intolerance could be curbed by law enforcement and government intervention.

"In the end, only the government can stop the spread of radical movements across the nation by enforcing the law and promoting the value of tolerance," Yenny said.

According to Yenny, a Wahid Institute survey reported 92 religious freedom violations in 2011, up 18 percent from 62 in the previous year.

The Wahid Institute, an organization promoting pluralism and peaceful Islam, also recorded 49 cases of prohibiting and restricting religion practices and 85 "controversial statements" from Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali in the same period.

Separately, Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) deputy chairman Ma'ruf Amin stood his ground on opposing interfaith marriage.

"Tolerance means that we are able to live side by side and peacefully with people from different faiths. Interfaith marriage, however, has nothing to do with tolerance. It's a different context," he said on Wednesday.

According to Islamic teachings, he said, Muslim women were not permitted to marry non-Muslims. "It's part of the basic teachings."

On places of worship, Ma'ruf said that people should refer to the joint ministerial decree on the subject that was the fruit of deliberations held by religious leaders in the country.

Ma'ruf said he agreed with the 80 percent of the respondents to the CSIS survey who said all restaurants should close during the day during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadhan, calling it an example of tolerance.

"That's a sign of respect for Muslim people during Ramadhan. If the restaurant owners wish to have their places open, they must put up a screen to conceal them," he said. (aml/tas)

Indonesian Christians face most violations: Rights watchdog

Jakarta Post - June 4, 2012

Jakarta – A recent study from one of Indonesia's rights watchdogs shows that Christians face the most religious rights violations.

The Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (Elsam) announced on Sunday that from January to April this year, there were eight cases of rights violations toward Indonesian Christians.

Elsam's researcher, Wahyudi Djafar, was quoted by tempo.co as saying that the cases include the saga of the GKI Yasmin congregation in Bogor, West Java, Filadelfia HKBP Church in Bekasi, also in West Java and other cases in Riau and Jambi.

"This kind of situation is a result of the government's weakness in protecting minority groups, especially under pressure of hard-liners," he said.

He added that beside Christians, the watchdog also recorded a total of four violations against the country's followers of nondenominational faiths from January to April. (asa/iwa)

Islamic law & morality

New Shariah rules only for local Muslims, says West Java city

Jakarta Globe - June 8, 2012

Yuli Krisna, Bandung – The top legislator in Tasikmalaya said on Wednesday that the headscarf requirement stipulated in the soon-to-be-enforced shariah-inspired bylaws in the West Java city would only affect Muslims.

City Council Speaker Otong Koswara acknowledged that there had been a rash of criticism regarding the bylaws, but said they were only intended to reinforce faith in the lives of the city's Muslims.

"The Muslims [in Tasikmalaya] are positive about it because it has to do with their beliefs. But that is for Muslims only. The non-Muslims will not be affected," Otong said. "But for other bylaws – no alcohol or gambling – those will be enacted for people of all religions."

The city said it would assign officers from the Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) to enforce the bylaws. Satpol PP will have a similar scope of responsibilities to the Shariah police in Aceh, which has also introduced shariah-inspired laws.

"We are not trying to impose shariah or become a Muslim state," Otong said. "This is just reinforcing people's desire to follow their beliefs. For people who don't abide by some of the laws, like the headscarf requirement, we will use persuasion and educate them. But we won't use persuasion for drugs and other offenses. There will be penalties for those according to prevailing laws and regulations."

The bylaws would prohibit women from going outside without headscarves, and would bar men and women who were not married from being alone together. Officials have previously passed bylaws penalizing adultery, homosexuality, alcohol use, witchcraft, pornography, blasphemy and abortion.

Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) legislator Eva Kusuma Sundari said the bylaws constituted "treason."

The local branch of the Indonesian council of Ulema criticized the bylaws, saying they must not flout national laws.

Shariah laws in West Java spur criticism from all quarters

Jakarta Globe - June 6, 2012

Ezra Sihite & Yuli Krisna – Shariah-inspired bylaws due to be enacted in the West Java city of Tasikmalaya have been condemned by Islamic leaders, locals and politicians, with one even lambasting the plan for "indications of treason."

Tasikmalaya city assistant Edi Sumardi told news portal Detik.com on Tuesday that one of the two bylaws would prohibit women from going outside without headscarves, while the other would bar men and women who were not married from being alone together.

This, he said, would "prevent things which can lead to evilness."

He added that he hoped the laws could be enacted before Ramadan, which begins in mid-July this year.

Last week, the city said it would assign officers from the Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) to enforce the bylaws, which are similar in scope to those in place in Aceh province. Aceh officials have previously passed bylaws penalizing adultery, homosexuality, alcohol use, witchcraft, pornography, blasphemy and abortion.

Members of the House of Representatives in Jakarta were quick to condemn the decision.

"The plan not only shows indications of treason and insubordination toward the Constitution but also violates the Law on Regional Autonomy, which stipulates that legal, security and religious affairs are not within the jurisdiction of regional authorities," said Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) legislator Eva Kusuma Sundari. "Obliging women to wear headscarves and forming a shariah police force is unconstitutional and discriminatory." Nurul Fitriasari, a Tasikmalaya housewife, said the bylaws were unfair and would be restrictive.

"Personally it won't affect me because I wear a headscarf anyway. But if you force people to wear one there will be resistance because it's a matter of choice," she said. "This is a country united in diversity and not an Islamic state."

Even the West Java branch of the Islamic Council of Ulema (MUI) criticized the plan, saying the bylaws must not contradict national laws.

"Are such bylaws in line with higher laws and regulations?" asked MUI West Java chairman Hafidz Utsman. "If one is a good Muslim, she will wear a head scarf regardless. So these bylaws aren't needed."

Activists and lawmaker slam headscarf bylaw

Jakarta Post - June 6, 2012

Yuli Tri Suwarni, Bandung – The planned enactment of a bylaw on obligatory headscarves in Tasikmalaya municipality, West Java, has drawn criticism from activists and a lawmaker but a hard-line Islamic group has given its support.

Hemasari, a women's rights activist from the province, considered the bylaw biased because "it is not based on practical social values".

She said the municipal administration, which is trying to gain Tasikmalaya the status of a "religious city", should have prioritized sharia laws on business and education rather than regulating dress codes.

The city passed the bylaw in 2009 and is now awaiting the administration's regulations for its enactment. The bylaw will require Muslim women, including visitors, to wear headscarves.

Hemasari said the requirement would not be relevant in the administration's efforts to change people's behavior. "Women may wear the scarf while in the municipality but will simply take it off when out of town," she told The Jakarta Post in Bandung on Tuesday.

Hemasari, who hails from Tasikmalaya, doubted that the bylaw would be effective in curbing the escalating crime rate or violations of Islamic norms as sought.

She told the administration to reflect on a previous bylaw banning alcoholic drinks. She said the bylaw had failed to curb death rates caused by alcohol.

Hemasari, a former member of Bandung Law Aid Foundation (LBH), joined a seven-day strike by four senior high school students in Garut in 1980 in protest at the school's refusal to let students wear headscarves.

"In the past, we were banned from wearing the headscarves, now we are forced to wear them. Let wearing a headscarf be an exclusively private matter for every Muslim woman," she said.

She told the administration to first implement Islamic business and education systems well so that wearing headscarves became desired instead of enforced. "If they prove they can benefit from sharia implementation, people will feel self-obliged to follow sharia law," she said.

Other than requiring women to wear headscarves, the bylaw also outlines 15 additional offenses, including corruption, prostitution, adultery, homosexuality, drug use and trafficking, consuming alcohol, looking at pornography, thuggery, promoting cults and abortion.

Criticism also came from Syaful Harahap, an NGO activist caring for HIV/AIDS victims. He wondered why abortion was categorized as violence, citing an Indonesia Ulema Council (MUI) fatwa allowing abortion for fetuses under 40 days in emergency situations.

He said he doubted whether municipal sharia-monitoring personnel could detect that someone was a homosexual or lesbian. "The matter might become complicated if a gay person arrested turns out to be transgendered," he said.

In Jakarta, Eva Kusuma Sundari, a lawmaker from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), said the draft regulation was unconstitutional and amounted to "discrimination against women".

"Local council members should oppose this kind of regulation. I also urge President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Home Minister Gamawan Fauzi to curb local politicians who are challenging our Constitution," Eva said.

Tasikmalaya city secretary Tio Indra Setiadi previously said that preparations were expected to be completed and the bylaw on Community Values Based on Muslim Teachings would be enacted soon.

The bylaw has been applauded by the Islam Defenders' Front (FPI), saying that the bylaw was accordance with Tasikmalaya's Islamic values. (asa/iwa)

Lawmaker condemns Tasikmalaya headscarf rule

Jakarta Post - June 5, 2012

Jakarta – A lawmaker is criticizing local legislators in Tasikmalaya, West Java, for drafting a regulation that would require all Muslim women, including visitors, to wear headscarves.

Eva Kusuma Sundari, a lawmaker from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), said the draft regulation was unconstitutional and constituted "discrimination towards women".

"Local council members should oppose this kind of regulation... I also urge President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Home Minister Gamawan Fauzi to curb the local politicians who are challenging our Constitution," Eva told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

Eva, a lawmaker on House Commission III overseeing legal affairs and human rights, was responding to a recent statement from Tasikmalaya officials that affirmed that the regulation would require Muslim women to wear headscarves.

Legislators on the Tasikmalaya City Council have been drafting a regulation to implement a regional bylaw approved in 2009 to promote community values through Muslim teachings.

Eva called the local legislators' move "a warning" for political parties to increase their outreach programs to protect the Constitution. (asa/iwa)

'Clothing is not the domain of government law': Setara

Jakarta Post - June 5, 2012

Jakarta – Governments have no right to control the domain of morality and should not create and enforce laws that control the way people dress, according to a researcher at human rights watchdog group Setara Institute.

When the city administration of Tasikmalaya in West Java decided to require all Muslim women, residents and visitors alike, to wear veils to enforce its sharia ordinance, Setara Institute researcher Ismail Hasani said that officials were violating civil rights.

"Opinions on clothing are relative. Even among people of the Islamic faith, there are radically different interpretations on how a Muslim should dress. As such, the way people dress is in the domains of morality. It is not something the law should enforce," Ismail told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

Besides targeting Muslim women, the 2009 Tasikmalaya administration's ordinance on Islamic-based values of community life also mandates that all adult Muslims have to cover their aurat, or private parts of the body that must be covered in Islam.

These sorts of laws that Tasikmalaya administrators wished to enforce were at odds with basic constitutional laws that guarantee freedom of religious expression, Ismail said, and should be evaluated by higher authorities.

Ismail referred to Law No. 32/2004 on regional governance as one way to challenge regional laws that may conflict with human rights. This law, he says, stipulates that the Home Ministry has 30 days after a regional law is released to evaluate whether or not that law conflicts with the constitution or central government laws.

If they do violate any of these, a presidential order can be sent to cancel such laws. "But after 30 days, if the government doesn't take any action, those who feel that their rights are being violated by certain laws can go to the Supreme Court to demand a judicial review for the laws in question," Ismail said. (png/iwa)

Tasikmalaya law to make Muslim women wear veils

Jakarta Post - June 4, 2012

Yuli Tri Suwarni, Bandung, West Java – Tasikmalaya, West Java, will soon require all Muslim women, residents and visitors alike, to wear veils to enforce its sharia ordinance.

"We are finalizing a city regulation so that [the 2009 Ordinance on Islamic-based Values of Community Life] can come into effect as soon as possible," Tasikmalaya City Secretary Tio Indra Setiadi told The Jakarta Post on Monday. "Hopefully, it will be finalized this month so it can be immediately promulgated."

He said the city administration might need to establish a sharia police force to ensure enforcement because the National Police were not able to handle sharia violations.

Tio said the enforcement of the ordinance would be different from that in Aceh because cases would still go to existing courts. "Law enforcement here will be different from that in Aceh. For example, there will be no canning. This ordinance is aimed more at educating people to live in an Islamic way," he said.

The ordinance, signed on Sept. 24, 2009 by Tasikmalaya Mayor Syarif Hidayat, was enacted amid local concerns that globalization would harm residents in a city known for its many Islamic schools.

The ordinance mandates all adult Muslims to cover their aurat, or parts of the body that must be covered under Islam. Fifteen other offenses are also proscribed other offenses, including corruption, prostitution and adultery, homosexuality, gambling, drinking alcohol, drug abuse, witchcraft, pornography, usury, thuggery, propagating cults and abortion.

Tasikmalaya City Council Speaker Ruhimat said the ordinance was passed because 99 percent of local population was Muslim and not due to pressure from Islamic groups.

He was not concerned about the law's impact on adherents of other religions. "Non-Muslims account for only one percent". "According to the regional administration law, we have the authority to determine our own administrative visions," Ruhimat said. (mtq)

Agriculture & food security

Climate change drives exodus from rice fields to Jakarta

Inter Press Service - June 4, 2012

Kafil Yamin, Indramayu – Another month of plying his becak in the capital city and Sarjo will be coming back to this West Java district to harvest the rice ripening on his 1,400 square meter paddy.

Sarjo hopes the harvest will fetch him a timely $325 to celebrate the holy month of Ramadan from July 20 to Aug. 18 before returning to becak-pulling in Jakarta.

Mona, who works as an entertainer in Jakarta's "Princess Entertainment" nightclub, is also preparing to return home for Ramadan. "But, my boss has warned me that if I leave for Indramayu without completing my contract I don't need to come back."

"Entertainment work is not easy," says Lisa, another Indramayu girl who works in a Jakarta disco. "I am expected to encourage guests to spend money and for that I need to be attractive, even after staying up night after night keeping drunken clients happy."

Lisa manages to send Rp one million ($100) every month to her parents. "They are too old to work on the farm, so they depend on my earnings," she explained.

Many residents of Indramayu, one of Indonesia's "rice bowls," are seasonal migrants to the city where there are opportunities to earn cash by pedaling becaks, running street food stalls and working as construction laborers.

Indramayu's women, too, are part of the exodus to the cities, working the nightspots, massage houses and the entertainment businesses. Those who are not so lucky end up as domestic workers. Either way, they are vulnerable to violence and sexual abuse.

The shuttling between Indramayu and Jakarta is dictated by the rice cropping cycles. The last months of the year, September, October, November and December, referred to as the "ber" period for the last syllable of those months, form the rainy season when rice seedlings are planted.

Four months later, the paddy is ready for harvest – at least that used to be the case until the cycle began to go awry with changing climate and erratic rainfall.

"We can no longer tell when it is going to start raining or when the rice is ready for harvesting, and so we just continue working in the city until we are sure," says Sarjo. "It costs money and time traveling between Indramayu and Jakarta."

Over the last few years, rice crops have been failing in Indramayu, not only because of dry conditions but also because unseasonal downpours have inundated paddies, affecting the quality and quantity of harvests.

In a 2007 report titled "Indonesia and Climate Change: Current Status and Policies," the World Bank warned that the country could become vulnerable to both prolonged droughts and unseasonal downpours.

These conditions, according to the report, could lead to changes in water supply and soil moisture, negatively impacting agriculture. Additionally, the Bank warned of a rise in sea levels and saline ingress into coastal farming zones like Indramayu.

Erratic weather in Indramayu affects jobs in Jakarta, which are often on contract. "Until a few years ago, we could be sure of our schedules and sign up for specified months," says Sudira, a construction laborer.

With incomes from both rice farming and the seasonal work in the cities uncertain, many of Indramayu's farmers have fallen into debt and been forced to sell off their small holdings, weakening their links to the land.

Lisa is unsure what will happen to the family's rice fields after her parent's become too old to work them, worrying that the land may have to be sold off. "Already, I am spending more time in Jakarta than in Indramayu."

A study conducted by the Fahmina Institute, a non-governmental organization (NGO) working on community empowerment, shows that 70 percent of Indramayu's 11,000 hectares of paddy fields are now owned by about 30 percent of its 125,000 people. The rest have become landless farmers, struggling to make a living in the cities. Many fall prey to human trafficking networks that have links in wealthy Asian countries like Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and the Middle East.

According to the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, a major international NGO, over the last three years, at least 1,500 girls from Indramayu have ended up in Japan as sex workers.

Supali Kasim, chairman of the Indramayu Art Council, explains that female migration from Indramayu goes back to a prolonged drought in the 1960s. That started a trend of women leaving Indramayu in droves to find work in the cities, depriving the rice farms of extra hands.

"Nowadays, women who cannot find work as entertainers in Japan are 'exported' as domestic workers to the Middle Eastern countries," Kasim said. Currently, there are 93,000 Indramayu women working overseas, going by figures available with insurance companies of which the women are clients.

A student organization in Indramayu, 'Sarinah', has petitioned the government to intervene and create conditions that would encourage the district's women avoid having to look for risky situations abroad.

Warisyah, a female farmer who has stayed back in Indramayu, said the government could start by ensuring that rice farming is viable. "They can build irrigation networks so that we don't have to be so dependent on rainfall," she said.

So far, the government's response has been to hasten completion of the controversial 900,000 Jatigede mega dam, capable of irrigating Indramayu and adjacent districts. But the dam is also expected to submerge five districts and 39 villages along with 3,000 hectares of rice fields.

In 1988, the World Bank cancelled plans to allocate 37 million dollars to the dam – planning for which began in 1963 – following doubts about its consequences to residents and the environment, but the government has pressed on and the dam is due to be operational by 2014.

By that year more of Indramayu's men and women are likely to have moved to Jakarta and other cities, many never to return.

Parliament & government

Yudhoyono issues new regulation legitimizing deputy ministers

Jakarta Globe - June 8, 2012

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has issued a new regulation ensuring the legitimacy of 20 deputy ministers in his cabinet, after the Constitutional Court declared earlier this week that their appointments were unconstitutional.

Yudhoyono signed the new presidential regulation on deputy ministers on Thursday, but his spokesman Julian Aldrin Pasha only disclosed the new rule on Friday.

"The presidential regulation on deputy minister appointments was signed by the president yesterday and will be announced at the right time and at the right opportunity," Julian told journalists in Ambon on Friday, on the sidelines of the president's working visit to the capital of Maluku.

The president issued the regulation just two days after the Constitutional Court declared in a ruling on Tuesday that the explanatory part of Article 10 of the 2008 Law on State Ministries was unconstitutional.

The court's nine justices said the explanatory section had created uncertainty because Article 9 of the same law ruled that the bureaucratic hierarchy of ministries comprised a minister at the top, followed by the secretary general, directors general and inspector general, without any mention of a deputy minister post.

If deputy ministers were instead part of the civil service ranks and not considered cabinet members, then they could continue in the posts even after the president's term had come to an end and his cabinet had been dissolved; a problem, given that the deputy minister post is often a political appointment.

The court said that if the president wanted to reappoint the current deputy ministers, he would have to issue a presidential decree without basing his decree on the annulled explanatory text.

The rest of the article, which is still valid, does allow Yudhoyono to appoint a deputy minister to shoulder some of the minister's responsibilities if deemed necessary.

The new presidential regulation, published on the website of the Cabinet Secretariat, setkab.go.id, thus replaces three previous presidential regulations on the appointment of deputy ministers, issued from 2009 to 2011, which were based on Article 10 of the state ministry law and its annulled explanatory section.

The new rule states that deputy ministers may be career civil servants or appointed from outside the bureaucracy. If appointees are the former, they will be temporarily discharged from their last positions while serving as deputy ministers, and may take back their old jobs when they are no longer deputy ministers.

Deputy ministers have no right to retirement funds nor severance pay when they no longer serve as deputy ministers, the new rule says.

"Deputy ministers are appointed and dismissed by the president. Their maximum term in office is the same as the president's, ending when the president's term ends," it adds in Article 4. (Antara/JG)

Indonesia's house of reps tops list of corrupt institutions, again

Jakarta Globe - June 6, 2012

Ezra Sihite, Ismira Lutfia & Markus Junianto Sihaloho – The House of Representatives again topped a list of corrupt institutions in a survey conducted by the Soegeng Sarjadi Syndicate (SSS), an independent research organization.

"A total of 62.4 percent, or 1,367 respondents, deemed that the current members of the House of Representatives are only looking to make a living," Muhammad Dahlan, one of the coordinators of the SSS survey, said in Jakarta on Wednesday.

Only a few of those surveyed perceived lawmakers in the legislative as faithfully representing the majority. "A total of 466 respondents, or 21 percent, deemed that lawmakers conduct their duties as representatives of the people," Dahlan said.

The survey, conducted in 33 provinces between May 14-24, questioned a total of 2,192 people, 54 percent of whom were male. Dahlan also said that the House of Representatives was seen more as a place for politicians to gather, rather than an institution to represent the will and aspirations of the people.

House Deputy speaker Pramono Anung, commenting on the results of the survey, said the public feedback should spark a response in the legislative. "Of course, this should become a correction for the DPR; whatever the results of the survey, it does show that public trust has gone down," Pramono said.

He added that such a view was understandable because the legislative has been at the core of numerous corruption cases, including the Hambalang stadium case and the Southeast Asian games' Athletes village project.

"Therefore, there should be an internal improvement, if the DPR is loosing the trust of the people," said Pramono, who is from the opposition Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P.)

The survey has named the tax office, the police, political parties and the Attorney General's Office as four other most corrupt Indonesian institutions.

Conversely, five of the "cleanest" institutions out of the 15 surveyed include the Regional Representatives Council (DPD), the presidential office, the Supreme Court and the Indonesian Military (TNI). (BeritaSatu/JG)

20 deputy ministers must be reappointed: Constitutional Court

Jakarta Post - June 6, 2012

Ina Parlina and Margareth Aritonang, Jakarta – The Constitutional Court has ordered President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to reappoint 20 deputy ministers following a challenge from the National Movement for Corruption Eradication (GNPK).

The court overturned part of Article 10 of the State Ministry Law, which is used to appoint deputy ministers, as unclear and unconstitutional.

"The elucidation of Article 10 of the State Ministry Law contravenes the Constitution. Thus, it is not binding," justice Achmad Sodiki said on Tuesday when reading the court's decision. The elucidation requires that a deputy minister be a "career official and not a Cabinet minister".

The Constitutional Court decided on the issue following a request by the GNPK to review the President's appointment of the deputy ministers, which it claimed would cost the state an additional Rp 1 trillion to pay for the officials' housing, transportation, salaries and allowances over three years.

The President's appointments of the officials has been criticized by his opponents.

The appointment of legal observer Denny Indrayana as deputy law and human rights minister last year drew the most ire. Critics said that Denny, a grade III/C civil servant, was too junior for a deputy ministerial post, which was typically held by a very senior grade I civil servant.

They pointed to the case of Anggito Abimanyu, the economic expert who headed the Finance Ministry's fiscal policy unit. The appointment of Anggito, an echelon IB civil servant, as deputy finance minister was withdrawn for a lack of "seniority".

"Without clear job descriptions, the appointment of deputy ministers will create an impression that the posts were set up simply as political gifts," justice Achmad Sodiki added.

The court disagreed with the plaintiffs' assessment of the appointments on the state coffers, saying that the nation would reap benefits from the deputy ministers, despite their financial expense, the court said.

After the hearing, justice Akil Mochtar said all deputy ministers had to stop the performance of their official duties pending their reappointment. GNKP representative Adi Warman said he respected the court's decision, urging Yudhoyono to also respect it by revising the decree soon.

Mualimin Abdi, litigation legislation chief at the Law and Human Rights Ministry, disagreed with the court, claiming that the deputy ministers could continue work while awaiting reappointment. Denny said that the ruling meant the mandate of deputy ministers was "more legitimate than ever".

Chief justice Mahfud MD opened the session announcing the court's decision with a statement criticizing both the plaintiff and the general public for exaggerating the case. "The case seems to be special for the public, but it is simple for the court; There is nothing extraordinary about the case," he said.

The plaintiffs, he added, had displayed contempt of court by telling the media that the Constitutional Court had deliberately delayed issuing the decision for certain interests. "There was no such postponement. Do not provoke things," Mahfud said before the decision was read.

Cabinet Secretary Dipo Alam said that he expected the affected deputy ministers to continue their work.

"I have not yet heard about any instruction. But, the deputy ministers will be at work as normal," Dipo said. "There will soon be a revision to the [appointment] decrees in line with the Supreme Court's ruling."

[Bagus BT Saragih and Hans David Tampubolon contributed reporting.]

Ethnic & communal conflicts

Clashes in Central Sulawesi 'engineered'

Jakarta Post - June 5, 2012

Ruslan Sangadji, Palu – Communal clashes and cyclical violence have long been an unfortunate feature in many areas of Central Sulawesi. Conflicting groups are slow to make peace and quick to reengage in fighting only days or weeks later.

The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) alleged there was reason to believe many clashes were deliberately created for specific interests.

"We believe particular parties have created a scenario to undermine peace in Central Sulawesi, in addition to authorities who tend to exacerbate the matter by omission," Komnas HAM deputy chief M. Ridha Saleh said recently.

Ridha cited the example of the residents in Nunu subdistrict, West Palu and Tawanjuka, South Palu, who were involved in a four-month conflict that had claimed six lives, injured scores of people and destroyed dozens of homes. The two sides reached a peace agreement in front of Palu Mayor Rusdy Mastura on May 4, only for a fresh conflict to emerge two weeks later in North Palu.

A similar chain of events took place in Sigi regency, Central Sulawesi, where a clash that broke out between residents of Watunonju and Bora villages in February had ceased at one point, before it flared up again on March 4, resulting in the death of one resident, dozens of injuries and a motorcycle being set alight.

The police appeared unable to do anything until troops from the Donggala/Palu/Sigi military command arrived to take control of the situation.

Ridha said that Central Sulawesi Police chief Brig. Gen. Dewa Parsana was responsible for security in the province and that he needed to offer an honest explanation to the public regarding the situation. "We have become a barbaric country. Where are the police? Is the police chief asleep or not firm in handling the situation?" asked Ridha.

Komnas HAM has since summoned the police chief for clarification. "If Dewa fails to answer the summons by Komnas HAM, we will recommend that he be immediately dismissed," asserted Ridha.

A number of quarters in Central Sulawesi felt the current security condition in the province was uncertain due to the ineffective role of the provincial police chief. "The police have never arrested or brought to justice those involved in the clashes as part of a deterrent," Komnas HAM's Central Sulawesi chapter representative Dedy Askari said on Monday.

Palu task force member Muhammad Rifai said that the Central Sulawesi Police chief had turned to the Village Security Assistance program to resolve the issue, despite the fact that the program had major problems in its implementation.

"The police chief has applied the same program in Central Sulawesi that he implemented when he was a regency police chief in Bali. The condition of both areas is very different," said Rifai.

Dewa denied the accusations. He said the clashes broke out due to the characteristics of the local residents who were very easily offended and provoked.

Sectarian conflicts in Poso

Poso was rocked by sectarian conflict from 1998 to 2002 that claimed around 1,000 lives and displaced 25,000.

Dec. 25-29, 1998: Riots begin on Christmas Day and last until Dec. 29 as a result of a misunderstanding among local youths. The riots peak with some 8,000 people involved in the clashes.

April 16-19, 2000: After a four-day sectarian clash, the Central Sulawesi town of Poso has yet to return to normal.

May 23, 2000: Three people are killed and 15 others injured, while scores of houses are set ablaze in fierce clashes that erupt in the town of Poso.

May 10, 2001: The government launches a Security Restoration Operation.

Dec. 20, 2001: The conflict abates after the two parties sign a peace accord in Malino.

Police & law enforcement

New Kompolnas commissioners come with much-needed muscle

Jakarta Globe - June 6, 2012

Arientha Primanita – A new legal foundation has given the National Police Commission the teeth it needs to monitor the work of the police, officials said on Monday at the inauguration of the body's new commissioners.

Djoko Suyanto, the coordinating minister for political, legal and security affairs, said after the inauguration ceremony at the State Palace that the commission, previously criticized as ineffective as a watchdog, has been given greater powers under a 2011 presidential decree.

"There are new aspects that will allow Kompolnas to be sharper," he said, referring to the commission by its abbreviation. "[Working] with civil society groups, this will help lead to improvement in the National Police."

Djoko added that whereas Kompolnas was previously just a forum for citizens to file complaints about the police, now it was empowered to follow through on those complaints, all the way to trial.

Adrianus Eliasta Meliala, one of the newly sworn-in commissioners and a professor of criminology, said the new decree gives Kompolnas a channel to provide input to the police.

"Now we're coming straight from the president. Any input we give to the National Police is being made in the name of the president, so we can be harsh," he said.

He said the most pressing job ahead for Kompolnas's nine new commissioners was to improve the police's human resource system, where promotions and placements are fueled largely by bribes to superiors.

Adrianus said another issue that needed to be addressed was that of heavy- handed investigation techniques.

A rights group noted on Sunday that 30 people had been tortured while arrested, interrogated or detained in the first four months of the year. Ten people were killed in those cases, according to the study by the Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (Elsam).

The new Kompolnas commissioners include two former police generals, Logan Siagian and Syafriadi Cut Ali, as well as three ministers, including Home Affairs Minister Gamawan Fauzi and Justice Minister Amir Syamsuddin. Djoko will chair the commission.

There are also three commissioners representing the civil society: Edi Saputra Hasibuan, a former journalist; Hamidah Abdurrachman, a law professor; and M. Nasser, a psychologist. Amir was not at Monday's swearing-in because he was out of town.

Police brutality still widespread: ELSAM

Jakarta Post - June 4, 2012

Jakarta – A human rights group alleged over the weekend that the National Police made widespread use of torture in their detention centers to extract information from detainees.

The Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (ELSAM) claimed in its quarterly report that at least 10 detainees, out of 22 cases of torture it investigated, had died in police detention. The ELSAM survey, conducted between January and April, found that 32 individuals had been tortured.

"We found that 12 of the 22 cases of torture against detainees were committed by active-duty police officers. This shows that despite massive media reporting about the practice the police have not yet learned their lesson and still resort to violence to collect information," said ELSAM researcher Wahyudi Djafar.

The survey, conducted by ELSAM affiliates interviewing former detainees, also shows that instances of torture occurred in 16 provinces in the country, including Jakarta, West Java, East Java, North Sumatra and Lampung. The survey also examined reports of torture in the news media.

In the quarterly report, ELSAM highlighted a number of brutal cases of torture including one in March this year that involved Erik Alamsyah, 21, in Padang, West Sumatra.

Erik was dead only four hours after being arrested for alleged motorcycle theft. He was found to have bruising all over his body and an injury allegedly sustained from a police officer's metal belt buckle. Six officers were questioned about the incident but no charges were pressed against them.

In another case, in Semarang, Central Java, Suryo, 48, was found dead in his detention cell when family members came to visit. Suryo was arrested at home, without warrant, for alleged gambling in January.

Officers in charge of his investigation told the family that Suryo had died of a heart attack in spite of indications of torture. Witnesses said they found bruises on his back and evidence of blows to his head.

Another survey by the Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta) also came to the same conclusion.

In the survey, released in April this year, LBH Jakarta found that of a total of 100 respondents, detainees in juvenile detention centers in Jakarta and Tangerang, Banten, 98 percent claimed to have suffered from various types of torture including verbal abuse, beatings, starvation, being held at gunpoint, stripped naked and sexual abuse. One respondent claimed to have been raped.

The survey also revealed that 82 percent of respondents, who were arrested between 2010 and 2011, were tortured while being questioned.

Activist Edy H. Gurning of the LBH Jakarta said torture remained the preferred method of extracting information from detainees by police officers because it carried little or no punishment.

Edy said that police officers found to have tortured detainees would only be charged under the Criminal Code (KUHP) or brought to an ethics-code tribunal. "This is a serious crime because it is not an ordinary type of violence. Torture is always used by somebody who has superior authority," he said.

Edy said that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had to take action against torture because Indonesia had ratified in 1985 the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

Both Edy and Wahyudi agreed that the convention alone was not enough. They called on the government to ratify the Optional Protocol of the convention which would open the country's prisons to independent external monitoring. "Nothing will be guaranteed until the Optional Protocol is ratified," Wahyudi said.

Earlier this year, the Partnership for Governance Reform (Kemitraan), LBH Jakarta and LBH Papua launched a report showing that torture was still rampant in Papua.

In interviews conducted from October to December 2011, 205 respondents – ranging from suspects, police personnel, prosecutors, correctional officers, human rights activists, academics and local tribal chiefs – testified that the police committed torture during arrests.

National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. Mohammad Taufik said that he would look into the report. Taufik said the police faced problems in investigating torture claims.

"We receive most reports of torture after detainees are released, making it hard for us to find evidence and to press charges based on the KUHP," he said, "In which case we can only use the code of ethics." (aml)

Mining & energy

Depok officials to use private plates on cars after subsidized fuel ban

Berita Satu - June 7, 2012

Ardi Mandiri – Less than a week after President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono banned the use of subsidized fuel for government vehicles, public officials in Depok announced plans to change vehicle license plates from government vehicle red to private vehicle black.

Public officials in Jakarta, Bogor, Depok, Tangerang and Bekasi have been barred from using subsidized fuel for government vehicles since June 1. But in the days following the announcement, numerous public officials have been caught fueling up with subsidized fuel thanks to the cars' tell-tale red license plates.

Now public employees in Depok want to switch to the standard black license plates. Wijayanto, General Affairs head of Depok, denied the license plates were changed to circumvent the new regulation.

"The purpose is not to deceive the fuel station officer when filling up," Wijayanto said, "but for the security of public officials when they are carrying out their duties."

Cars used by Depok regional secretary Etty Suryahati, public administration assistant Sayid Cholid and Youth, Sport, Tourism, Art and Cultural agency head of Depok Asep Roswana have been seen around town with dark-blue acrylic covering the red license plates.

The driver of one of these cars denied that the acrylic was used to purchase subsidized fuel. "I don't know why we're using a black plate," said the driver, who declined to be named. "But the [the car] always use Pertamax [non-subsidized fuel]."

Non-subsidized fuel costs, on average, twice as much as subsidized fuel.

Subsidized fuel ban for government vehicles will swell local budgets

Jakarta Globe - June 6, 2012

Tunggadewa Mattangkilang, Bayu Marhaenjati & Markus Junianto Sihaloho – Officials and analysts criticized on Monday the recently enacted ban on state-owned vehicles using subsidized fuel, saying it would only result in an increase in local government spending.

Since last Friday, all vehicles belonging to ministries, state institutions and state-owned enterprises operating in Greater Jakarta have been required to use only non-subsidized fuel.

The move came just two days after President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono announced a five-point fuel-saving campaign, which includes the ban.

"If all government cars use [non-subsidized] Pertamax, this will burden the state budget," said Rizal Effendi, the mayor of Balikpapan in East Kalimantan. "We are still waiting for instructions from the central government, and at the moment the ban only affects Jakarta."

Fuel subsidized by the central government, known as Premium, costs Rp 4,500 (47 cents) per liter and is sold by state-owned oil and gas company Pertamina. Non-subsidized fuel is sold by Pertamina under the name Pertamax. Other oil companies, including Shell, Total and Petronas, sell their own brands of non-subsidized fuel, which currently retails for between Rp 9,250 and Rp 9,800 per liter.

Rizal said if the ban were implemented nationwide, it would cause local governments' fuel budgets to balloon.

Komaidi Notonegoro, deputy director of the Reforminer Institute, an energy think tank, also questioned the benefits of the ban, saying it was too narrow to cut the government's subsidy bill and narrow the budget deficit.

Government-owned vehicles use around 1.3 million liters of fuel per day, or 500 million liters a year, according to one estimate. That is just a small fraction of the 40 billion liter quota for subsidized fuel in the 2012 state budget.

The ban, however, does carry symbolic weight for Yudhoyono following his administration's failed attempt to increase the subsidized fuel price starting April 1.

University of Indonesia economist Nina Sapti Triaswati said raising the price of subsidized fuel was the only way to cut the deficit, with subsidized fuel use expected to surpass the quota by six million kiloliters.

The recent ban also affects police and military vehicles, but Jakarta Police spokesman Sr. Comr. Rikwanto said they had already received their supply of non-subsidized fuel. "When our Premium stock runs out, we will use Pertamax," he said.

Indonesian Police Watch earlier warned that the restriction would only lead to extortion as officers struggled to cover their fuel bills. Officers often complain they don't receive enough fuel to conduct patrols.

Rikwanto said that although patrol cars normally refueled at police-owned gas stations, they were allowed to refuel at ordinary stations. "Don't get the wrong idea, the patrol cars are using the police quota because not every precinct has its own refueling station," he said.

There is an average of about 300 vehicles for each of Indonesia's 87 ministries and state institutions. The country's 141 state enterprises also have hundreds of vehicles in their fleets.

Lots of pledges, little show of end to officials' fuel use

Jakarta Globe - June 3, 2012

Markus Junianto Sihaloho & Bayu Marhaenjati – As one of the state institutions subject to a ban on using subsidized fuel for its vehicles as of the start of this month, the Jakarta Police say they are complying fully.

"We are converting to non-Premium [non-subsidized fuel]," Jakarta Police Chief Insp. Gen. Untung S. Rajab said on Friday. "We began doing that [on Thursday night] at midnight." However, he declined to talk about how the new rule would affect the police department's budget.

National Police spokesman Insp. Gen. Saud Usman Nasution said that all police cars were barred from using subsidized fuel and that violators would face disciplinary sanctions.

"Based on the order of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono on fuel and electricity savings, the National Police chief has stressed that as of June 1, police vehicles in Jakarta, Bogor, Depok, Tangerang and Bekasi are not allowed to use subsidized Premium gasoline," he said.

He added that patrol cars had a quota of 30 liters of fuel per day. Official cars for officers are limited to 7.5 liters per day, while those with engines larger than two liters would get 12.5 liters per day. Buses get 15 liters per day and motorcycles, two liters.

"For the other cities in Java and Bali, this rule will take effect on July 1," Saud said. "For cities outside of Java and Bali, it is still being discussed."

Earlier this week, Yudhoyono unveiled a national drive to save electricity and fuel energy. The program includes a prohibition on all state cars, including those from state-owned enterprises, from using subsidized fuels. Also subjected to the ban are vehicles that belong to mining and plantation companies.

Although legislators are under no obligation to switch to non-subsidized fuels, many said they would abide by the ban.

"We do not use official cars," Teguh Juwarno, from the National Mandate Party (PAN), said on Friday. "We were only given financial assistance by the state for the purchase of a car, and because we have no officials cars, we are not subjected to the ban."

However, he said he was certain that most legislators had "high morals" and would therefore not use subsidized fuels. "Surely, all will opt to empathize with the people," he said.

Leaders of the House of Representatives, the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) and the Regional Representatives Council (DPD), have the right to an official car, but most preferred to use their own.

Meilani Leimena, an MPR deputy speaker, is one of the few exceptions, but her driver, Supri, said that her official car, a Toyota Crown Royal Saloon, had always used non-subsidized gasoline.

"If it used subsidized fuel, it would certainly not run well. From the beginning, this car has always used Pertamax," he said referring to the high-octane, non-subsidized gasoline.

But a photo circulating online showed the Lexus LX460L used by Banten Governor Ratu Atut Chosiyah filling up on subsidized fuel at a gas station on Wednesday.

Atut expressed surprise when shown the photograph by reporters. "What, Premium? Just wait, I have to ask the driver about it," she said.

But she also claimed that her government administration still waiting for the central government to enforce the ban in the province. "Until now, the official instruction has not yet been issued," she said.

Muhyi Mohas, a legal observer from Banten's Tirtayasa University, said officials found filling up with subsidized fuel should be "morally sanctioned" to shame them.

[Additional reporting from BeritasatuTV.]

Economy & investment

Government warns of gloomy export outlook

Jakarta Post - June 7, 2012

Linda Yulisman, Jakarta – The government expects the trade surplus to plunge to one-fifth of last year's level as the worldwide economic downturn will likely continue to hurt the country's exports.

Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan said in Jakarta on Wednesday that Indonesia's trade surplus could fall to just $5 billion this year from $26.06 billion last year because the European recession and deteriorating demand from other export destinations would put more pressure on the country's exports.

Indonesia booked a surprise trade deficit for the first time in nearly two years in April this year, as exports slumped throughout the month.

Exports declined by 3.46 percent to $15.98 billion in April on a yearly basis – the first since September 2009 – while imports surged by 11.65 percent year-on-year to $16.62 billion, resulting in a $641.1 million deficit.

"Contrary to $26 billion we achieved last year, it will be a good thing if we can reach a $5 billion surplus this year. Many other countries will likely see their trade balance move into the negative," Gita told reporters after a hearing at the House of Representatives.

The estimate was realistic due to growing uncertainties in the eurozone and fears that economic recovery in the region would stall, he said.

At the end of last year, the Trade Ministry said it aimed to reach $230 billion in exports in 2012, up 12.96 percent from 2011. However, earlier this year, it revised the target, saying this year's exports would likely be level with last year's.

"I don't see our capacity to export increasing from last year," Gita said, adding that considering a large bulk of the country's exports were primary commodities, whose prices are vulnerable to fluctuations in the international market, export values may also decline.

Gita pointed out that against declining exports, the country would likely see its imports, particularly of capital goods, surge as local industry maintained production activities and realized investment.

During the first quarter of this year, imports of capital goods climbed by 35.55 percent to $9.34 billion, while imports of raw materials and intermediary goods jumped by 15.53 percent to $33.13 billion, according to Central Statistics Agency (BPS) data.

Economists have blamed poor industrial development policies for domestic industry's heavy dependence on imported materials.

Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) economist Latif Adam acknowledged that the trade surplus would surely fall because exports largely relied on 10 commodities, of which five were primary commodities, such as palm oil, coal and rubber, whose prices were determined by the international market.

"While the export values of these commodities decline, our imports of capital goods and raw materials, whose prices are more stable, rise constantly," he said.

Indonesian exports are also oriented toward 13 countries, including the China, Japan and the US, which make up around 70 percent of total exports, according to Latif.

"The dwindling demand from these traditional export destinations will surely put pressure on our exports," he said.

Exports to the EU have been slowing down since the last quarter of last year, while exports to the US and South Korea, have decelerated since the first quarter of this year. Non-oil-and-gas exports to China dropped by 0.5 percent to $2.05 billion in April from a month earlier, while exports to Japan, fell by 15.18 percent on a monthly basis to $1.43 billion.

Latif added that in order to anticipate a potentially continuos decline in its trade surplus, the government needed to curb the growth of imports.

"With its huge population, rising middle class and poor law enforcement, Indonesia is an easy target market for countries that have seen their exports drop," Latif explained.

The government needed to be more proactive in using available measures authorized by the WTO, such as safeguards and anti-dumping duties, to curb the influx of imports, he added.

Indonesia is backsliding on efficiency, executives say

Jakarta Globe - June 1, 2012

Tito Summa Siahaan – Indonesia has continued its slide down the economic competitiveness rankings compiled by a Swiss business school, suggesting the country may have failed to make the most of the opportunities presented by robust economic growth.

Indonesia was ranked 42nd in the 2012 survey conducted by IMD, down from 37th a year earlier. The country was ranked at 35th in 2010.

Indonesia's ranking fell in three of four indicators in the survey: government efficiency, business efficiency and infrastructure. For the last indicator, economic performance, the country's position was unchanged.

The survey of 4,200 executives from 59 countries found that economic dynamism and policy stability were the main attractions of Indonesia, while research and development culture and educational levels were the least attractive.

The survey was conducted last year, before the government's recent decision to introduce a 20 percent tax on 65 mineral ores, a policy proposal that surprised many businesses.

The survey, with analysis provided by the Jakarta-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, noted five key challenges for the country's competitiveness in 2012: enforcing the rule of law, relaxing relatively tight labor rules, overcoming poor quality infrastructure and the sluggishness of its development, improving the implementation of the government's budget and maintaining a good investment climate.

According to the survey, since 2010 Indonesia has improved relative to other countries in terms of corruption, competition legislation and bureaucracy, but has gone backwards in R&D spending, renewable technologies, urban management and infrastructure distribution.

In the Asia Pacific, Indonesia was ranked 12th out of 13 countries surveyed.

Firms in Indonesia cheer single time zone

Straits Times - June 1, 2012

Wahyudi Soeriaatmadja – Business and banking operations as well as travel are expected to get a big boost when Indonesia switches to a single time zone on Oct. 28.

The Indonesian archipelago now has three time zones and Jakarta is an hour behind Asean neighbors Singapore and Malaysia, as well as major trading partner China.

Officials expect the move to cut energy consumption, spur foreign exchange trading, and raise the productivity of businesses that operate in two or more time zones across the archipelago.

But safety concerns have been raised as the time zone switch would mean that residents such as schoolchildren would be leaving their homes while it is still dark.

Jakarta lies in the western time zone, which is one hour behind the central zone and two hours behind the eastern zone. About 190 million of the 240 million Indonesians live in the western zone – mostly on Java and Sumatra.

With the change, people living in the western zone will effectively be getting up an hour earlier than they do now.

"People will leave their homes earlier and turn off their electrical appliances earlier," Edib Muslim, spokesman for the Committee for the Acceleration of Economic Development of Indonesia, told The Straits Times.

Households consume 80 percent of the total electricity output in Indonesia, Edib said.

The committee, which is chaired by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, had proposed that the change take effect at midnight on a Saturday, when business is usually slow, before deciding on Oct. 28, a Sunday.

This date has added significance because it marks the 84th anniversary of Youth Pledge Day. In 1928, young Indonesians gathered in Jakarta where they pledged to be united as one nation speaking one language.

Officials have said that switching to one time zone helps to unite Indonesians even as it enables the country to become more business- friendly.

Edib reckons that the move would cut the country's energy consumption by between 1 percent and 3.5 percent. One percent translates into about 1.3 billion kilowatt hours per year.

Tourists will find it convenient to travel within a country that operates on one time zone instead of three, said Bagus Sudibya, deputy chairman of Bali Tourism Board.

"Travelling tourists may forget to adjust their watches when they cross time zones and miss a flight," Bagus told The Straits Times over the telephone from Indonesia's main tourist island.

Businesses that operate in two or more time zones now will benefit from the change, Sofjan Wanandi, chairman of the Indonesian Employers Association, said. "All our business branches can operate simultaneously, with no waiting time. It would mean higher productivity," he said.

Senior banker Albertina Dwita Harliani said the change will give Indonesian banks more time to trade as well as transfer funds denominated in the Singapore, Hong Kong, Australian or Japanese currencies.

"If Indonesian clients need to transfer Singapore dollars to a bank account in Singapore, we need to do it early in the morning now so that the funds will reach the account on the same day... We normally must do it by 10 a.m. at the latest," Dwita said.

A tax official in Papua, which is two hours ahead of Jakarta, looks forward to the time zone change. "Often, instructions come in at 4 p.m. Jakarta time. Our time in Papua is 6 p.m. and everyone has gone home. So we can follow up only on the next day," Hanan Haq told Detik.com.

Not everyone thinks it is a good idea. Former vice-president Jusuf Kalla, for one, believes that the move is "a mistake" that will benefit a few thousand people but disadvantage the majority. "Millions of schoolchildren would have to leave home while it is still dark. Their safety is at risk. Who will take responsibility?"

Meanwhile, in Thailand, which is one hour behind Singapore, the idea to bring its stock exchange into the same zone as its neighbors' was mooted briefly when former premier Thaksin Shinawatra came to power in 2001. But it failed to gain any traction and was dropped.

Analysis & opinion

Credits lost in tangle of Aceh's forest

Sydney Morning Herald - June 8, 2012

Michael Bachelard – In 2007, young Australian entrepreneur Dorjee Sun began a mission to save the world.

He criss-crossed the globe with a documentary crew, inserting himself into climate change negotiations in a way which eventually made him one of Time magazine's "Heroes of the Environment".

At the same time, climate change was killing John Howard. An Inconvenient Truth was playing on Australian screens, the Stern Review shocked the world and Kevin Rudd was capturing the popular mood that something – anything – must be done.

Howard and Sun both found climate salvation in the same place – the tropical peat forests of Indonesia.

"What are we going to do now, this year or next year, to make a difference?" Sun asks in his documentary, The Burning Season. "Because the forests don't have that long."

Howard's election year silver bullet was his version of a "direct action" pledge, which cleverly skirted his refusal to sign the Kyoto Protocol. Australia would start a global fund to fight forest destruction with the aim of halving the rate of deforestation and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 3 billion tonnes a year, 10 times the emissions reductions under Kyoto.

That December, the United Nations caught up, agreeing in Bali amid backslapping and cheers to accept REDD – Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation – as a way of tackling greenhouse gas emissions.

Five years on, the silver bullet has misfired. The REDD schemes in Indonesia, funded with Howard's money, have come under serious criticism for overstating their aims and underachieving. The Greens leader, Christine Milne, recently labelled the largest of them a "total failure".

The private sector has fared even worse. Most of its schemes in Indonesia have faltered or fallen spectacularly, recriminations flying.

Sun's landmark project is one of them. A deal he set up with the government of Aceh to develop a carbon credit scheme has stalled, perhaps fatally, and 770,000 hectares of forest is in limbo.

Sun himself, in the eyes of environmentalists, has sold out. For cash and shares worth millions, he sold half his business to a Canadian goldmining company, whose aim is to turn a forest-clad mountain-top into an open-cut mine using cyanide leaching to extract the riches.

His partner in the effort, former Aceh governor Irwandi Yusuf, was so disillusioned with REDD he accused the global community of using his region as a "carbon toilet".

Five years after high tide, Indonesia remains one of the world's biggest deforesters. Once Australia's best hope for REDD, it is yet to generate a single carbon credit or earn $1 for preserving forests. Credible observers wonder if it ever will.

For the Gillard government, this is more than a historical problem. Labor's carbon-trading scheme, which begins its fixed price period on July 1, needs a big supply of carbon credits sourced from other countries. Without 434 million tonnes of offsets bought offshore a year by 2050, the Treasury believes Australia cannot meet its modest greenhouse reduction targets.

It was believed saving Indonesian forests could supply many of these offshore credits quickly and cheaply. As things stand, even if a global carbon trade materialises, many wonder if Indonesian forests can ever play a part.

"REDD? It's like farting," one local villager says between sips of the famous coffee in Aceh, Indonesia's wild, westernmost province. "It's like selling air. It doesn't make sense."

We are in the heart of the massive Ulu Masen project, where ordinary people probably know more than most about REDD.

In concept, REDD is simple. Every tonne of carbon which is locked up in peat lands or inhaled by trees, and saved from logging or palm-oil plantations, creates carbon credits.

These credits can be sold to big companies who cannot reduce their own emissions for a lower price, and the profits go to the forest communities, local governments and project proponents.

In theory, it's win-win-win: emitters gain access to cheap credits; the forests and their orang-utan, tiger and elephant populations are preserved; and the income replaces the money on offer from the loggers, miners or palm-oil plantations. But these benefits have been excruciatingly slow to emerge.

Anwar Ibrahim is a farmer and a mukim – the leader of several villages – in an area at the edge of the Ulu Masen conservation area. He sits with his family on the wooden floor of a hut in one of his paddocks near the village of Sayeng, chuckling. REDD, it seems, amuses him.

"They're talking about selling air! But it's not whether I agree or disagree with that expression, it's simply that it doesn't exist, it doesn't happen."

Ibrahim has attended multiple meetings – he counts 31 since 2007 – on the concept of REDD. At a recent meeting, they were warned solemnly about potential corruption in a program that does not even exist.

This area was the hardest hit of all in the 2004 tsunami, and non- government organisations of all sorts helped rebuild it. The only ones, Ibrahim says, whose advice has been worthless are the ones spruiking REDD.

"They invite people and then we all go and sleep in the Hermes [Banda Aceh's only luxury hotel] and, after that, nothing happens... It's useless. The story of REDD is just a lie."

Ibrahim is careful to make clear he wouldn't mind being paid to save the forests. He turns to me, grinning broadly, and says: "Australia! Send us your money!"

He insists, however, there is no need for it because the local people have learnt to look after the forest anyway. But about 20 kilometres down the road, the smell of recent burning belies his faith.

Here, near the village of Kayee Lon, the ground is black, the forest devastated. This fire is fresh, was deliberately lit and was designed to clear the forest for palm oil. An 11-man crew, living in an open-sided wooden hut, are clearing the burnt trees then cutting down more. They chop them up for firewood. Their leader, Safari, says they have been working for local landowners since 2007, clearing forests at the rate of about 15 trees a day.

Safari says his team have often seen orang-utans retreating further into the remnants of the tangled, swampy woods as they go about their work.

The ground underfoot is soft. Step too heavily and your foot sinks deep. This is peat and it contains millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide. As long as the water-soaked forest is intact, the carbon remains locked in place. But as soon as it is cut and burnt, then drained via canals for agriculture, the woody mass – which can be metres thick – decomposes, releasing its stores of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Sumatra, Borneo and West Papua contain some of the richest peat forests in the world. Those in Borneo hold up to 70 times the carbon emitted annually by the combustion of fossil fuels worldwide.

The forest in this beautiful, mountainous province remains relatively intact because, for decades, the fierce combatants in the Free Aceh Movement's separatist battle against Indonesia used it for refuge.

But that is changing as people seek economic opportunities. The burning in Kayee Lon is probably illegal. Under national laws, clearing deep peat is prohibited. But good luck getting these laws enforced. On one fire-scarred plot, marked and unmarked police cars unload oil-palm seedlings. Workers tell us "high-ranking officials" from the police own the land.

"Everyone has a permit," says a worker, Syukul, on a neighbouring piece of land.

This may well be true. In rural Indonesia, landownership is rarely clear. Perhaps the local bupati (the equivalent of a mayor) has issued a permit to farmers with claims over these plots. Perhaps the regional government has done so. Someone, somewhere may have been bribed.

When democracy came to Indonesia following the resignation of president Suharto in 1998, the government in Jakarta radically decentralised, conferring significant power on local authorities and regional governments. These local governments have the power to issue permits over land, but have very little scrutiny.

Corruption is rife, and the judges are as bad as the bureaucrats. In Aceh, 20 million rupiah ($2120) is enough to get criminal charges dismissed.

In Indonesia, it's not just the forest that's tangled and impenetrable.

But when Sun first came to Aceh in 2007 and sold the miracle of REDD to his new friend governor Irwandi, none of this seemed like an obstacle and it is not suggested that either has acted dishonestly.

"I did make a lot of promises to him," Sun tells the Herald. "I painted a picture which, I guess, only a naive 29-year-old can do, which was, 'Hey, Gov! Trust in this market which is going to happen and you will be paid for this forest protection'."

Sun and Irwandi's plan was to save 770,000 hectares of the forest, home to 982,000 people as well as orang-utans, elephants and Sumatran tigers. Every year for the next 30 years, 3.4 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions would be avoided and the credits sold on the global carbon market.

They even convinced US brokerage firm Merrill Lynch to trade the carbon credits for them in an options deal worth up to $10 million. The deal made modest celebrities of Sun and Irwandi; Merrill Lynch won the 2008 Carbon Finance Transaction of the Year.

Sun is not so naive now. The contractual negotiations were gruelling, and the local politics between the five bupatis was complex. Even an accurate map of the area proved elusive. Then last year, his sponsor, Irwandi, became involved in a fight for his political life which, two months ago, he lost.

A spokesman for Irwandi's replacement as Aceh governor, Zaini Abdullah, would say only that everything to do with Ulu Masen was now under review.

Jeff Carmichael, a businessman and foundation chairman of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, has a "seven-figure sum" invested in Sun's project. He remains fully supportive of Ulu Masen, but says the biggest risk had always been Aceh's politics. If the new governor went cold, the project "probably comes to a stop; there's no point putting more money into it," he said.

In Sun's view, the biggest problem was the failure of the global community to come up with a large-scale carbon market for REDD credits.

Carbon credits are bought and sold on what's called the "voluntary market". Airline companies use this to offset the emissions from their flights, as do some manufacturing companies, to paint themselves green.

If a global trading market evolves under the UN's painfully drawn-out processes, it would be a "compliance market" which would be vaster, deeper and able to provide financial incentives to develop REDD schemes. But the only existing market, run by the European Union, does not accept forest credits.

So, as illegal burning and mining continues, Sun's project is becalmed. Forest rangers are employed to protect the trees, but some "still cut the trees themselves", says Firman Hidayat, who once helped train people here in REDD.

Sun says he has not given up, but he has changed his idea of what's possible. He is now focused on "REDD 2.0" – doing direct deals with big companies to protect remnant forests within their concessions.

In Ulu Masen, REDD 2.0 meant ceding a forest-clad mountaintop, Miwah, a half-day trek from the nearest road, to a company that wants to turn it into a 6000-hectare, open-cut gold pit.

In May last year, Sun sold half the shares in Carbon Conservation to the Vancouver-listed miner East Asia Minerals for $US700,000 plus 2,584,210 shares in the mining company. At the time, the shares were worth $13.3 million.

The gold under Miwah is worth $5 billion, but East Asia Minerals does not have a permit to mine it because it lies underneath protected "primary forest".

Environmentalists have accused Sun of allowing the company to improve its chances of gaining government approval by "greenwashing" the venture. But Sun says the deal was a genuine attempt to sacrifice a small part of Ulu Masen to protect the rest. The miner would pay "substantial" royalties to save the forests outside the actual mining zone.

Sun says the gold company's former chief executive Mike Hawkins was sincere in his desire to develop "green gold" – an environmentally friendly product that could be compared to "blood-free diamonds", using green mining techniques.

But East Asia Minerals has changed chief executive twice since then. Late last year, it installed Ed Rochette, a renowned international mining Mr Fixit who told a recent conference in Bali that Indonesia was, "without a doubt, one of the top three places [in the world] for current investment in mineral projects".

Sun concedes that Rochette regards the "green gold" deal as "not really something that he would have done". Any pretence of special mining techniques has also disappeared from the company's releases – Rochette said in January that "the ore [at Miwah] should be able to be processed in a conventional gold cyanidation circuit".

The gold deal has severely dented Sun's reputation in Aceh.

"They heard it and said, 'Oh, we are cheated'," Hadi Daryanto, the secretary- general of Indonesia's forestry department in Jakarta, recalls. One of Irwandi's environment advisers, Wibisono, said: "It just got rid of all the trust we already gave to Dorjee".

"People started to think that... the intention was not to protect the environment, [but for Sun] to occupy all that land and then, later, on-sell it to the mining company or plantation."

Since then, Wibisono says the mining company have tried every method possible to have the forest recategorised.

For his part, Irwandi has become morbidly disillusioned with the failed promise of REDD. Three months after Carbon Conservation inked the Miwah deal, Irwandi issued a permit for a palm-oil company, PT Kallista Alam, to use 1605 hectares of peat swamp for a plantation in the Tripa conservation zone.

When the peat swamp burnt, killing an estimated 100 orang-utans, Irwandi said the environmental disaster was his "pinch" – a wake-up call – to the world.

"The international community think our forest is a free toilet for their carbon," he told the Herald in April. "I wanted some funds to create a livelihood for people who lost their jobs [when the forest was locked up]. The money did not come. REDD or blue I don't care. Where is the international attention on that?"

Sun said he was still on good terms with Irwandi, and argued passionately that the deal with the mining company was pragmatic and necessary.

"In Indonesia... do you think $5 billion of gold would end up never being extracted? Honestly? I knew whether it was them, or a tycoon, or the new governor's brother, or some minister's cousin... someone is going to get that gold," Sun said.

Better that it be exploited by a listed international company with corporate responsibilities to shareholders. He agonised over the deal and agreed it might take 30 or 40 years before we knew if the decision was the right one.

"I'm probably not going to go to environmentalist heaven any more... But far out, man! Shit. I mean, five, six years in Indonesia, you realise that you've got to play the game smarter."

The Thinker: Justice for Sukarno

Jakarta Globe - June 6, 2012

Yanto Soegiarto – Old documents reveal that on Aug. 4, 1965, Indonesia's first president, Sukarno, collapsed in his room at Merdeka Palace. An early diagnosis showed that he had suffered a stroke.

His deteriorating health came at a time when the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI)'s influence was beginning to grip the country, prompting a heated rivalry with the Army. A team of doctors from China treated Sukarno, adding to suspicion that the president had links to the communists.

In March 1967, Suharto became acting president, and was officially inaugurated the following year. Sukarno was not allowed to travel to the capital.

Sukarno sent his daughter Rachmawati to ask Suharto if he could return to Jakarta. He was allowed to be transferred, under strict solitary confinement, to Wisma Yaso in Jakarta, which was the residence of Sukarno's Japanese-born wife, Dewi.

On June 6, 1970, Sukarno's 69th birthday, Rachmawati and Sukarno's son Guntur were allowed to visit him. Rachmawati recalled that Sukarno's body had swelled from kidney failure, which had never been properly treated.

There was a complete ban on the press covering Sukarno's condition. Relatives and friends were prohibited from visiting him.

An Associated Press photographer took a picture of Sukarno using a telephoto lens. Rachmawati also photographed her father, which prompted the military police to interrogate her. Rachmawati demanded to know the real status of his father and was told, "Sukarno is under detainment."

There was no legal status for Sukarno. He suffered years of improper medical treatment. The military police's statement to Rachmawati was the only account of his status. Not long after Rachmawati last visited her father, he died.

Unlike Sukarno, Suharto enjoyed the luxury of legal protections and extraordinary press coverage after he stepped down as president. Live coverage gave a minute-by-minute account of Suharto's deteriorating health at Pertamina Hospital.

Suharto was summoned to the Attorney General's Office on charges of corruption. He was named a suspect in an embezzlement case related to his charity foundations. He died of organ failure and was given a state funeral with full military honors.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono himself led the ceremony. "I, on behalf of the nation and the Indonesian Military, surrender the body and soul of Hajji Muhammad Suharto to the soil of the motherland," he said.

Several attempts to bring Suharto to court failed over the last decade of his life because he was said to be too ill. But Suharto is given credit for bringing stability and economic growth to Indonesia and the region.

Sukarno's legacy is that he freed the nation from imperialism and colonialism. He also gave birth to Pancasila, the Indonesian state ideology. As the country's first president, Sukarno has long been regarded as a symbol of national unity. He was a revolutionary fighter and a charismatic leader who united a nation through his personality.

Sukarno and Suharto left legacies of their own times.

Now, Jimly Assidiqie, the former chief justice of the Constitutional Court, has called for Sukarno's name to be cleared because he was never tried or found guilty in a court of law. He has called on Yudhoyono to render clemency to the country's founding president.

Assidiqie said clearing Sukarno's name was far more important than the recent presidential pardon given to Australian drug smuggler Schapelle Corby. Sukarno's contributions carry more meaning in the hearts and minds of Indonesians, he said.

"Though the president has the prerogative, we still think Sukarno deserves more as a historical figure and Indonesia's first president," Assidiqie said.

If Corby's appeal for clemency was granted by the president, who cut five years from her 20-year sentence, it would be fair to award clemency and clear Sukarno's name. Only then will Yudhoyono leave a legacy to be remembered.

[Yanto Soegiarto is the managing editor of Globe Asia, a sister publication of the Jakarta Globe.]

(In)secure Papua

Jakarta Post Editorial - June 2, 2012

Development programs cannot proceed and are practically interrupted in times of conflict or violence. And dialogue, which is universally accepted as the best formula to settle problems of security and order, is not possible in situations of open conflict and violence.

Therefore, dialogue, which has been the commonly agreed mechanism to bring a permanent end to the prolonged, complicated problems of social and economic disparities in Papua (Papua and West Papua provinces) – oftentimes thus associated with sporadic demand for independence – is obviously interrupted. Worse is the fact that such security and order issues have never been properly addressed and in many cases, such problems have remained unsolved, with neither perpetrators nor masterminds having been uncovered or arrested.

The latest violence reported in Papua, where an Indonesian teacher and a German tourist were shot by unknown gunmen in two separate incidents, occurred on Tuesday.

The victim of the fatal shooting in Mulia, the capital of Puncak Jaya, was identified as Anton Arung Tambila, 36, an elementary school teacher. An unidentified man shot Arung in the head on Tuesday evening while he was serving customers at his sugar kiosk next to his house, killing him instantly.

Arung's killing is the latest in a series of fatal shootings in Mulia, and the second civilian to fall prey to unidentified assailants in May alone. Arkilaus Refwutu, 48, a motorcycle taxi driver, was shot to death on May 17. A German tourist, identified as 55-year-old Pieter Dietmar Helmut, was shot several times in broad daylight by an unknown man while walking with his wife, Medina Pachon, on Jayapura Beach, about 10 kilometers from Jayapura's downtown district.

The question is why such violent acts and shooting sprees remain rampant in the country's easternmost province despite the heavy presence of security personnel there?

There is no official data available on the number of security personnel in Papua, but it is estimated that some 16,000 Indonesian Military (TNI) troops are stationed in Papua. If combined with the police, roughly at the same staffing levels as the TNI, there are over 30,000 security personnel on duty in the province. The figure excludes hundreds of intelligence officers deployed there.

The overall figure of security personnel should therefore be more than enough to cover the two relatively scarcely populated provinces and leave no room for repetition of such shootings. The previously agreed-upon dialogue should continue – and be prioritized.

Book & film reviews

A new group fights for understanding in Indonesia

Jakarta Globe - June 8, 2012

Will Sinclair – It was the kind of event that Lady Gaga would have surely supported. About 60 people squeezed into Kedai Tjikini in Central Jakarta on Wednesday night to watch the 2009 film "Prayers for Bobby" and discuss the intersection of faith, sexuality and pluralism in Indonesia. The event wasn't so controversial, perhaps, considering that these ideas are debated regularly on campuses across the country. But given the events of the past month, such concepts now carry much greater weight.

"Hate stems from a lack of knowledge," said Mohamad Guntur Romli, an activist from Nahdlatul Ulama, Indonesia's largest Islamic organization, who spoke at the film screening. "When people say homosexuality is a European or Western import, they are neglecting the fact that alternative sexualities have always been present in the archipelago. When we talk about diversity in Indonesia, diversity of sexuality is one of those components."

The made-for-TV movie, based on a true story, stars Sigourney Weaver as Mary Griffith, a deeply religious woman who rejects her son as a sinner when she discovers he is gay. After her depressed son commits suicide, she begins to re-examine her faith, looking for alternative interpretations of the Bible that might be able to reconcile her son's homosexuality with Christianity.

The film screening was part of a series of events being held over 10 days by the newly formed Beda.Is.Me peace movement to mark the anniversary of the birth of the Pancasila state ideology on June 1. Beda.Is.Me, an Indonesian play on words that simultaneously means "I am different" and "diversity," was formed as a response to recent violent attacks on religious minorities, the controversy over Canadian author Irshad Manji's visit to Indonesia, and, of course, the all-encompassing saga surrounding Lady Gaga.

The movement was launched at Kedai Tjikini last week with a photo exhibition of victims of religious violence.

It is notable that increasing religious intolerance and violence has sparked growing calls for a return to the values of Pancasila. While the state ideology was once co-opted by Suharto to serve the interests of the New Order regime, it is now re-emerging as a counterweight to extremism and exclusivism.

Daniel Awigra, campaign manager at the Association of Journalists for Diversity (Sejuk), and one of the movement's organizers, explained the philosophy behind Beda.Is.Me.

"We realized that the silent majority is not going to act in oppositional campaigns against radical organizations," Daniel said. "They are always going to choose what's safe for them. A positive campaign that targets the state is likely to have a greater effect."

Tantowi Anwari, also known as Thowik, advocacy manager at Sejuk, added: "We really want to emphasize that this is a peaceful movement that is not seeking to confront those intolerant groups in our society. Rather we are targeting the state for allowing repeated and increasingly intense acts of religious-based violence to occur."

Prudent words, given that Thowik was stripped and beaten by members of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) last month for supporting the Congregation of Batak Protestant Churches Filadelfia parish's right to worship.

With that in mind, Beda.Is.Me. is holding what is to become a fortnightly event titled "Aku Cinta Indonesia" ("I Love Indonesia") in front of the Presidential Palace on Sunday starting at 1:30 p.m. The peaceful event provides an opportunity for religious groups and concerned citizens to express their love for the country and deliver their complaints about the state's handling of pluralism.

The Beda.Is.Me movement will culminate in a diversity concert, billed as a tribute to victims of religious violence, at Taman Ismail Marzuki at 6:30 p.m. on Sunday. The concert will feature local acts Saras Dewi, Marjinal, Lokal Ambience, Melanie Subono and headlined by Bali punk outfit Superman Is Dead.

Alongside the concert on Sunday night, Beda.Is.Me is hosting a premier of the film "Romi dan Yuli Dari Cikeusik" ("Romi and Yuli From Cikeusik"), a love story set against the backdrop of the 2011 Cikeusik tragedy. The film is directed by prominent local director Hanung Bramantyo ("Ayat-Ayat Cinta"/"Verses of Love") and explores issues of prejudice and hate surrounding the attack on the Ahmadiyah community, which killed three.