An American Samoan has demonstrated her support for West Papuan independence during the territory's Flag Day ceremony at Veterans Memorial Stadium in Pago Pago

Valerie Adams and her 7 year-old daughter displayed placards with the message "Free West Papua" to coincide with the visit by the Indonesian Ambassador to the US. Budi Bowoleksono had been invited by the territorial government to attend Flag Day celebrations.

Ms Adams questioned why Jakarta has provided US$300,000 toward construction of the Pago Pago Youth Center. "Because I'm not sure why we're inviting the Indonesian government. We get federal grants. So when they donated to help out with our centre, I'm questioning the motive. American Samoa government should not be affiliated with the Indonesian government at all," she said.

Valerie Adams claims West Papua is being forcibly occupied by Indonesia, and hopes that more people will learn about the situation.

Source: http://www.radionz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/302000/american-samoan-protests-indonesian-hold-of-papua

Vanuatu wants Indonesia out

Vanuatu Daily Post - April 20, 2016

Jane Joshua – The incumbent Government led by Prime Minister Charlot Salwai wants to see the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) become a full fledged member of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG).

Daily Post was informed this was part of Decision 57 of 2016 on the MSG in the Council of Minister's (COM) 9th Ordinary meeting.

The COM endorsed the decision to instruct the government to include the ULMWP's full MSG membership status as part of the agenda in the upcoming MSG Leaders Summit on May 6, 2016 which will take place in Port Vila and remove Indonesia as an Associate member of the MSG.

West Papua's United Liberation Movement for West Papua was granted Observer Status whilst Indonesia was admitted as an Associate Member into MSG in 2015. The ULMWP initially applied for full membership.

Meanwhile the COM also endorsed the decision not to accept the appointment of Fiji Diplomat Amena Yauvoli as the new Director General of the MSG Secretariat.

Ambassador Yauvoli signed his new contract of employment with the MSG Chair, Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare in Honiara on April 11, replacing Solomon Islands' Mr Peter Forau who resigned in December 2015.

Vanuatu's COM approved that Vanuatu's seasoned diplomat, Ambassador Roy Mickey Joy who was nominated for the MSG top post and other candidates who applied to seek a full judicial review. Most of the past and present leaders in Vanuatu have been staunch advocators for West Papua's self-determination.

Amid pressure from the public, a former Prime Minister, Moana Carcasses, made a bold stand for self-determination for the people of West Papua and the Kanaks of New Caledonia at the MSG Leaders' Summit in Noumea, 2013.

"We cannot have wool pulled over our faces and pretend that we are fine when those who are free know that the spirit within us desperately longs for freedom," he was quoted to have said back then, acknowledging the existence of human rights violations and atrocities being committed against West Papuans as a people in their motherland whilst at the same time pointing out "how each of the MSG member countries treasured their relationship with Indonesia and wished to see this strengthen into maturity and how as a result of this respect for Indonesia as a friend, Indonesia was accepted as an observer in the MSG".

At present, the member countries of the MSG are: Solomon Islands (Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare), Vanuatu (Prime Minister Charlot Salwai), Fiji (Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama), Papua New Guinea (Peter O'Neill), FLNKS Head representative (Mr. Victor Tutugoro), Indonesia as Associate Member (President Joko Widodo) and West Papua as Observer (ULMWP General Secretary Octavianus Mote).

As co-founding father of the MSG and Vanuatu's first Prime Minister Fr. Walter Lini once said, "Vanuatu will not be fully free until all Melanesian are free".

Indonesia has made it public that it has gained the support of Fiji and Papua New Guinea for its push for full membership in the MSG.

Source: http://dailypost.vu/news/vanuatu-wants-indonesia-out/article_7be72f50-9e74-5bb5-a6e6-760924eb66e3.html

Papua rights among concerns around Jokowi's UK stay

Radio New Zealand International - April 20, 2016

The British prime minister David Cameron has been urged to challenge Indonesian President Joko Widodo over his country's human rights record, including West Papua.

The call from Amnesty International comes as President Widodo visits the United Kingdom this week as part of his European tour.

Referring to concerns around Indonesia's performance on such matters as executions and Shari'a law, Amnesty says Indonesia's record in human rights is an obstacle to any trade deal that Jakarta seeks to forge with the UK.

An Indonesia Researcher at Amnesty International, Papang Hidayat said the NGO's was concerned about the country's prisoners of conscience, including 27 in Papua.

He mentioned a Papuan political activist, Steven Itlay who was this month charged with having committed "rebellion" and faces life imprisonment.

Source: http://www.radionz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/301980/papua-rights-among-concerns-around-jokowi's-uk-stay

Marching West Papua into MSG

Vanuatu Daily Post - April 19, 2016

Len Garae – Thousands of members of civil society organisations and the public in Port Vila and rural communities around Efate, are expected to take part in a peaceful march from Fatumaru Bay to the Melanesian Spearhead Group Secretariat at Independence Park, to demand the MSG Leaders to give full membership of the Melanesian Sub Regional Organisation to the people of West Papua next Friday on April 29.

Chairman of the Vanuatu West Papua Association in Port Vila, Pastor Allan Nafuki makes the announcement ahead of the planned peaceful march from Fatumaru Bay to the MSG Secretariat. He is appealing to all responsible people to take part in the peaceful march.

The outspoken Chairman is confident his committee's application will be approved by the police to allow the planned march to take place. "We are organising the Civil Society Organisation Parallel Forum four days prior to the MSG Leaders' Summit on May 3, which will be hosted by the Vanuatu Government," the Chairman says.

The Chairman and members of his committee have been lobbying the people in a series of public places in the Capital including market houses, to collect signatures from members of the public who support West Papua to become a full member of MSG.

It is understood the Vanuatu Christian Council is also encouraged to allow members of individual churches to also sign the petition at the entrance to their churches.

Pastor Nafuki says they have already collected 5,000 signatures and are targeting 12,000 to let Indonesia know that the people of West Papua are not alone in their bid to gain their rightful place in MSG.

In preparation to the march, a Civil Society Organisation Parallel Forum will be hosted by the Vanuatu West Papua Association in Port Vila from April 29 to May 2.

The West Papua Association is inviting civil society counterparts from Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, the Solomon Islands and New Caledonia to also take part in the Forum. Some of the regional participants are already in Port Vila.

Source: http://dailypost.vu/news/marching-west-papua-into-msg/article_177ddaa1-00e1-5a55-bc82-d66f02df6e0c.html

Tell the truth about West Papua, journalists told at rights forum

Pacific Media Centre - April 19, 2016

Margaret Wise, NADi, Fiji (The Fiji Times/Pacific Media Watch) – Giving voice to the voiceless and championing the rights of all people is essentially about telling the truth.

And that is how journalists in Fiji and the Pacific should approach the ongoing human rights violations happening in West Papua.

This was the key message highlighted by Professor David Robie, journalist, author and director of the Auckland University of Technology's Pacific Media Centre, as he gave The Fiji Times a sweeping snapshot of issues he thought were important for journalists in the region.

"From a journalist's point of view, it is a human rights issue," he said. He said as far as he was concerned, journalists had a responsibility to cover widely, and as often as they could, West Papua's call for self-determination – a 50-year plus struggle for liberation from Indonesian occupation.

"They are Pacific. They should never be lost sight of. That is one reason the media in the Pacific should latch on to the significance of this struggle and how important it is to the Pacific. "For me, the biggest and most staggering human rights issue in the Pacific is West Papua. This has to be a global story."

'Untold story'

He said the absence or lack of coverage of this "untold story" had much to do with journalists and editors being unaware and indifferent to a struggle that had persisted for so long.

"The trouble is this all comes back to journalism and telling the truth. If the truth is not being told, how do people respond? For some reason many media are also indifferent, they don't actually realise this is a big story."

Dr Robie was chief guest at the Human Rights and Media Forum attended last week by senior journalists and government communication officers from 13 Pacific countries.

Supported by the Australian Government and European Union, the forum reaffirmed the vital role of the media in highlighting human rights issues and the importance of news reporting with a human rights-based approach.

Dr Robie said over the past two years there had been a dramatic change to awareness of the plight of West Papua and attributed this to social media, a platform that had allowed the West Papuans to tell their stories themselves, despite the restrictions placed on foreign journalists.

Human rights agencies vary in their estimates of the number of indigenous Papuans who have died since Indonesia first invaded the region – then a Dutch colony – in 1962 and wresting control through the UN-organised "Act of Free Choice" in 1969 widely regarded as a sham. However, a Sydney University academic's report alleging "secret genocide" estimated 100,000 deaths.

Atrocities evidence

"The West Papuans have been able to get evidence of human rights atrocities in a way that other NGOs and media can pick up and so now through social media the story can be told more widely."

He said he hoped the Australia and New Zealand media would commit themselves to providing more coverage on the issue. West Papua is the western half of the island of New Guinea, just 200 km north of Australia.

Over time, Dr Robie said, the West Papua issue could also become a major source of instability in the Pacific as it would have implications across the border with refugees.

He said in countries such as Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea – where citizens were sympathetic – there were West Papua communities already established and exiles were travelling around the region telling their stories. "So for journalists there are many people there for journalists to interview, to keep the stories alive and tell the truth, any opportunity you get, write the story."

Dr Robie said it was encouraging that West Papua had achieved observer status in the Melanesian Spearhead Group. With the support of the Solomon Islands, and social media's ability to push information and supporters to the forefront, he said the region should be ready for some significant changes in media coverage.

Learn from history

Political leaders, he said, should also learn from history. "East Timor's invasion was treated like a lost cause. The media saw it largely as a non-issue because governments recognised the sovereignty of the Indonesian government, even though it was invaded illegally.

"People used to say East Timor would never be independent but 24 years later it did, at a terrible cost. It's a lesson for us. Somehow we don't learn from history. Because if it happened in East Timor then hope should not be lost for West Papua. Unfortunately political leaders are a long way behind the reality of what is happening.

"It's a real important story for Pacific journalists. Human rights is beyond trade. Human rights should actually override trade. Many countries in the world turned their backs on a major human rights violation. Human rights violations is the main issue that the story should be told from.

"Ultimately, history will move on and the leaders that don't recognise this now will be exposed in time. West Papua coverage is in the context of human rights issues and the accountability processes, there is no accountability in a whole range of areas. Through social media more people are asking questions and there is more debate and discussions about the situation in West Papua."

Dr Robie said as credible sources, churches were critically important to discussions on West Papua. He said fortunately, through the commitment of leaders and researchers, the churches had been generally able to publicise reports in a systematic way.

The forum was organised by the Regional Rights Resource Team (RRRT) of the Pacific Community (SPC) in partnership with the Pacific Media Assistance Scheme (PACMAS), the Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) and the University of the South Pacific

Source: http://www.pmc.aut.ac.nz/pacific-media-watch/region-tell-truth-about-west-papua-journalists-told-rights-forum-9625

Human rights & justice

HRW urges EU to greet Jokowi with a message about rights

Jakarta Post - April 17, 2016

Elly Burhaini Faizal – Human Rights Watch (HRW) deputy Asia director Phelim Kine has said the critical issue of human rights should not get lost in the diplomatic mix during the visit of President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo to Europe next week.

Kine said that human rights abuses, past and present, remained a serious problem in Indonesia, impacting victims' families, women and ethnic, religious and sexual minorities. Jokowi's interlocutors in Europe needed to keep these issues front and center in their meetings, he said.

"That includes expressing support for the Indonesian government's tentative first steps toward accountability for the mass killings of 1965 and 1966 that claimed at least 500,000 lives," Kine said.

"A government-supported symposium on April 18 may seem unremarkable, but it's an act of political courage that European leaders should praise."

President Jokowi is set to discuss trade ties and intelligence sharing with European Union officials and his counterparts in Belgium, the Netherlands and the UK during the visit.

Kine went on to say that Indonesian women were counting on European leaders to express their outrage at the government's failure to stop the abusive "virginity tests" women are forced to undergo when applying to the National Police and Indonesian Military.

Dozens of political prisoners, mostly peaceful activists from Papua and the Moluccas, also needed European leaders to tell Jokowi that they were not forgotten despite their long imprisonment, he added.

The rights activist said European leaders should speak out for sexual and religious minorities who were vulnerable to local-level threats and violence. "Government officials have recently jumped on the Islamist bandwagon to make increasingly hostile remarks against Indonesia's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) population," he said.

According to the HRW, public rhetoric against Indonesia's religious minorities, including the Ahmadiyah, Shia and some Christian congregations, has for a number of years been accompanied by serious violence against these communities.

"Jokowi may be following in the footsteps of his predecessor, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, by failing to protect religious minorities from Islamist and other militant groups," said Kine.

He said Jokowi also needed to hear the concerns of European leaders about the Indonesian government's tight grip on the access of foreign media, academics, and nongovernmental organizations to the country's easternmost island of Papua. "These restrictions defy Jokowi's May 2015 declaration that Papua was now open to foreign media."

Kine said the measure of success of Jokowi's European trip would be its balance of meaningful engagement on human rights issues with discussions on economic and security ties. (ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/17/hrw-urges-eu-to-greet-jokowi-with-a-message-about-rights.html

1965 mass killings

'Genocide denial with a smile': Indonesian govt possess evidence of massacres says

ABC News - April 22, 2016

Mark Colvin: There's widespread scepticism among Indonesia experts after a top Indonesian cabinet Minister yesterday said there was no hard evidence of anti-communist massacres in the country in 1965.

It's long been estimated that the coup led by general Suharto was associated with the deaths of around half a million people – carried out on the pretext of eliminating the communist party.

As we reported last night, Minister Luhut Panjaitan even cast doubt on the existence of mass graves, and challenged the media to find them.

Well Jess Melvin completed her PhD at Melbourne University on the mass killings in one corner of Indonesia, Aceh.

She unearthed a trove of solid documentary evidence, not only that the killings took place, but that the order came right from the top. Now at Yale University, Dr Melvin gave me her reaction to the Minister's statement.

Jess Melvin: Genocide denial with a smile – we have the appearance of wanting to come to terms with the past. A fulfilment of the promises of the (inaudible) government to deal with human rights abuses.

But in full, if we actually listen to what they're saying, they're not only denying what happened but, in fact, justifying what happened. They're saying from the start that there will be no apology for what happened, in fact, that no they think it was the right thing to do.

Mark Colvin: They say there's no evidence and nobody's ever found any mass graves. What evidence is there?

Jess Melvin: Well the Indonesian government for some years now have been at work. The Komnas HAM, the national human rights commission, has been at work compiling evidence of the genocide.

They've produced an 800 page report which details what happened, they spoke to many victims and they've also been compiling the official documents that exist from this time and yet they refuse to release this report because of its damning nature.

Mark Colvin: To look in more granular detail if you like, your research was in Aceh and you managed to get some remarkable documents. If you look at those documents, what do they show about how it actually worked on the ground?

Jess Melvin: Well they show a very clear chain of command from Jakarta, from Suharto, to the Indonesia military commander in Sumatra, Mokoginta, to the provincial military commander in Aceh and (name in audible) and presumably the other provincial military commanders at that time.

And then going down again to the district and inter-district military command, (inaudible) lots of fighting. There were meetings held to co-ordinate the genocide, and not only within the military leadership but between the military leadership and civilian leadership, to coordinate what was happening.

We must remember that genocide is a massive undertaking for a nation; it's a nationwide campaign that requires full mobilisation and utilisation of everything that the state has to be able to pull this sort of campaign off.

And I would say that there was no level of either the Indonesian military or government that was not aware of what was going on at that time. Mark Colvin: So to be clear for those who may not be familiar with exactly what was going on at the time, you're saying that you have a document chain that goes right from the town level, right up to general Suharto, who was the leader of the group that toppled Sukarno, who was the leader at the time – and Suharto then went on to rule Indonesia for the next few decades.

Jess Melvin: That's correct. And if fact, not only do we have orders where the military comes out and says, it is mandatory for our civilians to assist the military to completely annihilate the Indonesian communist party, or those associated with them, but there's also documentary evidence showing the military and the government supporting the creation of the death squads at the local level that implemented the killings.

The creation of these death squads and then records of them being handed out guns to do these killings; these were American and British machine guns and the bullets that they were given to implement the killings on the ground.

Mark Colvin: When we talk about it as a genocide, it was not just a political genocide, it spread out to the extent that in some cases, for instance, the Chinese community was automatically assumed to be aligned with the communist party and so it became and ethnic as well as political genocide?

Jess Melvin: Yes, and, but when you say a political genocide, this went beyond the simple members of a political organisation – which by the way had been perfectly legal up until the morning of the 1st of October 1965.

There was a conscious strategy of not only capturing and murdering members of this organisation, but also their entire families, including their children. This was done in very systematic ways.

Mark Colvin: So it was guilt by association?

Jess Melvin: Yes, that's correct. In fact, there's some places in rural areas where they would go through and wipe out PKI villages. Yes, very much so guilt by association. This is something that affected everyone.

If you weren't directly involved in this, either as a perpetrator or as a victim, you would have witnessed what was going on. And this is the story that we hear from people when we go into Indonesia and ask them about their experience during this time.

Mark Colvin: Dr Jess Melvin of Melbourne University, now at Yale.

Source: http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2016/s4448857.htm

Q&A: 1965 and national reconciliation

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2016

Devina Heriyanto – G30S and PKI used to be a pair of infamous abbreviations in the Indonesian public sphere. The army-backed government created the acronyms to name the September 30 movement of the now-defunct Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in 1965. The events of 1965 involved the murder of six high-ranking army generals followed by the mass killing of hundreds of thousands of PKI sympathizers.

Indonesia's National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) held a two-day symposium called "Dissecting the Tragedy of 1965, the Historical Approach" on April 18-19. The conference examined the mass killings that took place from 1965-1966 under the pretext of an communist purge through testimony given by experts, survivors of the atrocities and members of the military.

What happened in 1965?

On Sept. 30, 1965, six Army generals were kidnapped, murdered, and buried in Lubang Buaya, Jakarta. The PKI was blamed for this "failed coup attempt", thus the G30S/PKI term. The Army special battalion quickly took control and captured PKI leaders. What followed was a systematic killing of PKI members across the country from late 1965 until 1966. The PKI was disbanded, along with communism and Marxist/Leninism as an ideology.

Before 1965, then-President Sukarno introduced a political concept dubbed "NASAKOM" (Nationalism, Religion and Communism), since the three were the biggest political factions in domestic politics. PKI was the third largest communist party in the world after the Soviet Union and China.

Why is it a problem?

There was no definite evidence that the PKI killed the generals, or that the group was attempting a coup. Victims were murdered without a fair trial, only based on allegations or accusations that they were communists. The number of casualties is thought to be around 500,000, or even up to 2 million by some calculations.

The involvement of army and the government of Indonesia made the issue even more troubling, showing an abuse of power over fundamental human rights.

Another is the impact of the killing on the families, and the discrimination toward those who were related to the party. More people became victims of torture for their alleged support for communism. The usual scenario was: they were "disappeared", tortured and jailed without trial for years, even decades, including the writer Pramoedya Ananta Toer. Even after released, the prisoners could not have a normal life as they had special marks on their ID card.

The government sponsored propaganda against the PKI, starting with the annual viewing of the movie "Pengkhianatan G30S/PKI" (The betrayal of the Communists) to students (most of the students were children even though the film has gory and traumatic elements in). The government named the old well Lubang Buaya (the sanctuary of crocodiles) as the Penghianatan PKI Museum and produced by a series of regulations discriminating against people allegedly related to communism.

What has been done by Indonesian government?

1965/1966 marked the transition period between the Old Order (Sukarno) and New Order (Soeharto). The New Order lasted for 32 years. During the New Order, communism was considered taboo. The purge was relatively unknown since it was left out of school textbooks, as opposed to the G30S itself, which was explained in detail with the Army acting as the protagonist. It was not until Reformasi that discussions regarding the 1965 atrocities sprung up.

Abdurrahman Wahid, widely known as "Gus Dur", was the first government official to deliver an apology to the victims. However, his apology was criticized by elements within the Indonesian government. In March 2000, Gus Dur, acting as president, raised the motion to revoke Tap MPR No. XXV/1966 on the disbandment of communism in Indonesia. The motion was rejected. Under President Megawati Soekarno Putri, Tap MPR No. 1/2003 was passed to reaffirm the ban on communism.

In 2013, Palu Mayor Rusdy Matura apologized to the survivors and families of victims. The apology was demanded by SKP HAM, a human rights organization in Palu. Rusdy admitted that as a boy scout, he had helped the military to guard suspected PKI members during the purge.

Komnas HAM, a human rights body created by government but independent from it, produced a report in 2012. The report shows that the army and government were heavily involved in the massacre. Komnas HAM later proposed recommendations to the Attorney General's Office (AGO), to bring the perpetrators to court and to deliver an apology to the victims, and yet these proposals were dismissed.

Where are the efforts of reconciliation coming from?

Most of the efforts come from grassroots movements. Syarikat Masyarakat Santri Untuk Advokasi Rakyat (The Muslim Community for Social Advocacy), or Syarikat, was established in 2000 under Nahdatul Ulama. In 2003, the organization started to organize meetings between the victims and those involved in the 1965 massacre. The meetings produced recommendations that were read in front of legislators at House Commission III overseeing legal affairs in 2007. The organization called on the government to apologize and restore national dignity.

Kontras (The Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence) has requested the US government to release documents about what happened in Indonesia during 1965-1966. The US has records about the level of involvement of the US government, according to US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) executive director Kenneth Roth.

Last year, the International People's Tribunal on 1965 was held at the Hague, the Netherlands. The tribunal concluded that the Indonesian government was responsible for the massacres and oppression that followed the events of Sept. 30, 1965. The Tribunal has no power to grant compensation to the victims, as it only serves to open up past human rights violations and offer a chance for victims to testify.

What about the law?

A legal battle in favor of reconciliation and the restoration of dignity has been disappointing. The 2004 Law on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was expected to open up past cases of human rights violations, was revoked after a judicial review by Constitutional Court. To date, communism remains a crime, according to Law No. 27 1999.

In 2005, a class action suit was filed by the representatives of victims in the Central Jakarta District Court. The lawsuit was filed against then-president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the four previous Indonesian presidents. The lawsuit asked for compensation and rehabilitation. The Central Jakarta District Court rejected the lawsuit, reasoning that the suit should be filed in the State Administrative Court.

What is the current government's position?

During his presidential campaign, President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo stated in his mission statement that he would work to settle past cases of human rights abuses. However, during his administration, many discussions on human rights were shut down or banned.

For example, in October 2015, a man with Swedish nationality was deported and blacklisted for visiting his father's grave, a victim of the 1965 massacre. Organizers of the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (UWRF) had to cancel some events on the 1965 massacre due to pressure from the government, including a screening of the Oscar-nominated documentary The Look of Silence.

Students were prohibited by the Indonesian Embassy at the Hague from attending the International People's Tribunal on the 1965 massacre in November 2015 with the threat that their scholarships would be revoked. Attorney General HM Prasetyo stated that there was "no need for other parties to be involved in this."

In December 2015, a reading and discussion of a drama script entitled "Family Album: #50years1965", was banned by Jakarta Police.

The symposium in April 2016 was significant because it represented the first effort from the government to discuss the massacre. However, there was pessimism about the government's real intention. Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Pandjaitan bluntly stated that the government would not apologize for the massacre. Even more disappointing, Luhut questioned the 500,000 figure, and said: "I don't believe the number was more than 1,000. Probably less." (dan)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/academia/2016/04/22/qa-1965-and-national-reconciliation.html

Government must restore Sukarno's reputation, rights activist says

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

The government must straighten out Indonesia's history by repairing the reputation of former president Sukarno who has been accused of being involved in the 1965 abortive coup that was blamed on the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).

"He was a victim of the 1965 tragedy as there was a 'stealthy coup' by Soeharto towards Sukarno," human rights watchdog Imparsial executive director Al Araf said in Jakarta on Thursday. "Like it or not, Sukarno has to be placed in our history as a national hero. He was not involved in the 1965 tragedy," he went on.

The kidnapping and murder of six Army generals on Sept. 30, 1965, led to the purge of PKI members, sympathizers and their families by the military under Soeharto's leadership. It is estimated that between 500,000 to 1 million people with any sort of leftist connection, regardless of their age or level of involvement were massacred.

Soeharto seized power in 1966 with the controversial March 11 Indonesian Presidential Executive Order (Supersemar). The Provisional People's Consultative Assembly (TAP MPRS) XXIII/1967 on Sukarno's involvement in the 1965 tragedy was later issued in the New Order era, in which the decree dismissed Soekarno's political rights.

On whether the mandate was merely an order to restore the country's security or a transfer power to Soeharto remains a mystery. Several historians have also still question whether Sukarno or not was forced to issue the mandate.

Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) historian Asvi Warman Adam has recently called on the government to rehabilitate the 1965 victims' reputation including Sukarno.

"The government must remove any stigma and discrimination related to 1965 incident. The 1965 victims have to be rehabilitated, including Sukarno's reputation," Asvi said during the national symposium on the 1965 tragedy in Jakarta on Monday, as quoted by kompas.com. (vps/ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/govt-must-restore-sukarnos-reputation-rights-activist-says.html

Komnas HAM commissioner says President Widodo is lying about 1965 mass killings

CNN Indonesia - April 21, 2016

Abraham Utama, Jakarta – National Human Rights Commission (Komnas HAM) Deputy Commissioner Dianto Bachriadi says that Indonesian President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo is lying about the 1965 tragedy.

"It's not true that the president has never received a report about developments in the handling of gross human rights cases, including 1965", said Dianto in a written explanation on Thursday April 21.

During his overseas visit to London, England this week, Widodo issued a statement in relation to the National Symposium titled "Dissecting the Tragedy of 1965, a Historical Approach" that was held in Jakarta on April 18-19.

Widodo said that the government will continue to be consistent in resolving cases of human rights violations saying that the government has no wish for these cases to be exposed in a confrontational manner.

He also claimed that he had not yet received any reports about effort to resolve the issue by state institutions authorised to resolve cases of human rights violations such as Komnas HAM, the Attorney General's Office or the Coordinating Ministry for Political, Legal and Security Affairs.

"I'm yet to receive any reports. [So] there's no need to comment on it so as not to inflame [the situation]. We want to resolve it right, not confront anyone", he said as quoted by the Detik.com news portal.

This statement however is contradicted by Dianto. He explained that during the commemoration of Human Rights Day on December 10, 2014, Komnas HAM handed over all of its executive investigation result summaries to Widodo.

During the meeting with Widodo, said Dianto, the Komnas HAM commissioners also reported on the position of the AGO which had failed to follow up on their findings with a criminal investigation. "The president should have been more thorough and examined the issue further", he said.

According to Dianto, after receiving the Komnas HAM report Widodo should have immediately ordered Attorney General Prasetyo to start a criminal investigation.

Related to the 1965 tragedy, Vice President Jusuf Kalla also spoke out this week. Yesterday, after meeting with Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, he said that the government will not apologise to the victims of human rights violations in the decade after 1965.

His reason for this is that the authenticity of the data on the total number of victims in this case has not been verified yet. "There is contrasting data that says there were hundreds of thousands of victims. Where are those hundreds of thousands? There's no one that can point them out right? If there were hundreds of thousands there would be many mass graves right. There isn't any one who can point these out", he said. (abm)

[Translated by James Balowski for the Indoleft News Service. The original title of the report was "Komisioner Komnas HAM Sebut Jokowi Bohong soal Tragedi 1965".]

Source: http://www.cnnindonesia.com/nasional/20160421154750-12-125640/komisioner-komnas-ham-sebut-jokowi-bohong-soal-tragedi-1965/

Government takes conciliatory tone to 1965 victims

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Hans Nicholas Jong – While maintaining a rigid stance on the death toll and a refusal to apologize for the 1965 tragedy, the government on Tuesday softened its position on the settlement of unanswered questions surrounding the dark events, vowing to reconcile with all victims of the violence.

The government announced its commitment during the close of a two-day symposium on the purge entitled "Dissecting the Tragedy of 1965, the Historical Approach", the first such dialogue spearheaded by the government.

"We have to acknowledge the state's involvement [in the violence]," Presidential Advisory Board (Wantimpres) member Sidarto Danusubroto said. "It is the responsibility of the nation to heal this wound."

According to Sidarto, the symposium will recommend full rehabilitation for all victims, allowing their rights to be restored and removing the stigma now attached to them.

President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo would, he said, issue a presidential decree based on a list of recommendations from the symposium currently being drafted by a team of experts. The team will submit the recommendations to the government in the next two days.

"Lastly, I hope this kind of dialogue will be conducted not only in Jakarta, but also in other regions under the state protection. The state has to be present to protect all citizens. That's the basic constitution," he said. "The quality of a country's democracy is measured by its ability to protect human rights and minority groups."

Public space for free expression in Indonesia is gradually shrinking, with public discussions and stage performances banned with increasing frequency.

The Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (ELSAM) recorded that in 2014, at least 27 events related to the 1965 communist repression were subject to restrictions and bans, including 17 film screenings and discussions, four cases of forced dispersal of meetings of victims, three cases of intimidation, three cases of deportation and forceful arrest and one magazine recall.

The latest censorship took aim at the organizers of the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival, which canceled a session dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the events under pressure from local authorities.

National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) commissioner Muhammad Nurkhoiron said one way to measure the success of the symposium was to see if people could subsequently hold public discussions and events related to the tragedy without any fear.

"If the government can't guarantee that, the symposium will have failed. But if any future public discussions can be held with guaranteed protection from the government, there will have been real progress," Nurkhoiron, who is a member of the committee tasked with drafting the recommendation, told The Jakarta Post.

The closing day of the symposium also saw progress on efforts to resolve the investigations into the anticommunist violence, having been in limbo for years.

"The President could establish a special commission by issuing a presidential decree, but usually in other countries, there needs to be approval from parliament first. So the government could set up a commission, but it would require approval from the legislature first," Sidarto said.

Over the course of the symposium, which examined the mass killings that took place in 1965 and 1966 under the pretext of an anticommunist purge through testimony provided by experts, survivors of the atrocities and members of the military, calls mounted for the establishment of a commission.

Harkristuti Harkrisnowo, a professor of law at the University of Indonesia and acting executive director of the Human Rights Resource Center (HRRC), said a commission was vital to speed up the reconciliation process between the government and the victims of the tragedy.

"We can't rely on judicial mechanisms, which have often proven ineffective," she said, expressing her belief that a commission could unravel the truth behind the violence.

In 2004, a law was passed mandating the establishment of a commission for truth and reconciliation. However, the Constitutional Court scrapped the law in December 2006 on the grounds that it contravened the constitution.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/govt-takes-conciliatory-tone-1965-victims.html

NU calls on government to reveal truth behind 1965 tragedy

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Marguerite Afra Sapiie – Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the largest Islamic outfit in Indonesia, has called on the government to uncover the truth behind the violence and repression that wracked the nation in 1965-1966.

According to NU executive Imam Aziz, the government needs to continue to promote dialogue and shed light on the tragedy, which saw the deaths of around 500,000 people and unjust imprisonment of millions accused of links to the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).

"The most important thing is to reveal all the facts, and then determine how to continue," Imam told thejakartapost.com on Tuesday, adding that revealing the truth would put an end to the "glorification" of the perpetrators, who regarded themselves as victors and heroes.

NU itself is alleged to have been implicated in the 1965-1966 communist purge, frequently clashing with PKI sympathizers across Java around that period.

In 2000, then president Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid publicly apologized to the victims on behalf of Pemuda Ansor, NU's youth wing, for helping the military commit its atrocities; the apology remains controversial today.

While some of the organization's members maintain an uncompromising stance on the what they see as the necessity of the killings, a number of NU representatives have apologized on behalf of their predecessors in forums held in cities across Java, Imam said. The apologies were a good step forward for NU, he added.

According to Imam, NU has yet to decide on a firm position in regard to the latest government efforts to settle past human rights abuses and reconcile with the victims, but the ulemas are expected to decide one soon.

"I hope NU will take a positive position, instead of further hampering [the reconciliation process]," Imam said. The government for the first time in history organized an official event to openly discuss the 1965 massacre, involving the survivors, the government, the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), academics, and human rights groups.

The two-day event, entitled "Dissecting the 1965 tragedy", comprised discussions among stakeholders and aimed to provide recommendations for the government on the efforts to settle the past atrocities. (bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/nu-calls-on-govt-to-reveal-truth-behind-1965-tragedy.html

No conclusion yet about 1965 tragedy

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Anton Hermansyah – The two-day symposium on the 1965 tragedy ended on Monday, but historians could not reach any conclusions about this dark episode in Indonesian history, although the organizers tried to invite all related parties to participate in the discussion.

The organizers invited three sides to the symposium: members or relatives of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) who were the primary victims of the tragedy, ex-military personnel who were involved in operations against members of the PKI, and those who were accused of being PKI members and communist academics.

Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), Indonesia's largest Muslim organization, was involved in the killings, and historical activist Imam Azis told thejakartapost.com that NU had data on PKI members who were caught in Central Java and Yogyakarta, but exact historical details were difficult to confirm.

"They were brought to a temporary building such as the Vredeburg Port. Then they were brought to Gunung Kidul and killed in October, 1965. But we do not know how and where to confirm," he said.

Imam said there was no war at the time and PKI members in Central Java did not know what had happened in Jakarta. He denied that NU deliberately helped the military eradicate people associated with the PKI. "NU did not know anything at that time. We were told that we were under attack. The choice was to kill or be killed," he said.

The 1965 tragedy started with the kidnapping and murder of several military generals. The PKI was blamed for the atrocity. The revenge by the military caused the death of between 500,000 to 1 million alleged PKI supporters throughout many parts of the country. Millions of people were imprisoned without being trial.

The episode has sparked off a good many conspiracy theories regarding what happened within the military and government at the time. Sukmawati Sukarno Putri, the daughter of founding president Sukarno, said the PKI was tricked by information of a "general's council" that would attempt to orchestrate a coup d'etat against Sukarno.

"They were manipulated by Soeharto to catch the generals through a double agent named Syam [Kamaruzzaman] who worked for both Soeharto and D.N. Aidit. But actually the PKI became a tool for Soeharto to show off his heroism," she told thejakartapost.com on Monday. Aidit was the leader of the PKI.

Meanwhile, historian Yosef M. Djakababa, said the technical aspects of the events were still blurred and could not be confirmed by any documents. "There is no evidence yet regarding Syam, who was said to be a double agent. In an extraordinary military court, Syam said he reported only to Aidit without mentioning Soeharto," he said.

He confirmed that the military had always been anticommunist. It had fought a PKI rebellion in 1948 and the military was afraid Sukarno was getting too close with the PKI. However, despite its fears, Yosef claimed the military remained broadly loyal to the government. The killing of the generals remains a mystery, he said.

"Lt. Col. (ret.) Untung admitted in a military court that there was an order to kidnap the generals but there was no order to kill them. There is a conspiracy theory about possible infiltration in the operation," Josef said. (bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/no-conclusion-yet-about-1965-tragedy.html

Victims estimate survivors affected by 1965 massacre around 26 million

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Despite denials from the military, victims of the 1965 massacre have reaffirmed that the number of people killed in the tragedy could reach as many as 3 million, and the total number of those affected by it might reach 26 million people.

"If we count the affected survivors, the number could reach 26 million," said Bedjo Untung, the head of the Murder Victims Research Foundation (YPKP) 1965/1966, during the national symposium on the 1965 tragedy in Jakarta on Tuesday.

Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan earlier dismissed the estimation released by the victims. Sintong Panjaitan, a retired special forces general, claimed recently that the number was closer to around 80,000 people.

According to a study compiled by a victims group, there are plenty of mass graves located in Java, Sumatra and Bali, including seven mass graves in Pati, and five in Pemalang, both in Central Java. "So it's impossible that the number is only 80,000 people," Bedjo said.

The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has launched an investigation into the case, but its recommendations have never been followed up by the Attorney General's Office (AGO). Komnas HAM and the Presidential Advisory Board (Wantimpres) held a national symposium on April 18-19 in Jakarta to discuss the 1965 tragedy and to offer further recommendations to the government. The symposium involved academics, human rights activists, victims, politicians and representatives from several government bodies.

It is unlikely that the whole truth behind the tragedy of 1965, and the convulsions that triggered it, will be uncovered, as the majority of those involved have already passed away and some sections of the declassified documents were blacked-out prior to their release. It will take two to three generations to free this country from the impact of 1965. (vps/dan)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/victims-estimate-survivors-affected-by-1965-massacre-around-26-million.html

Survivors of 1965 desperately seek rehabilitation

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

After more than half a century without clarity on the identity of perpetrators or those who orchestrated the event, some survivors and victims of the 1965 tragedy hope that the government will rehabilitate their names as they have been stigmatized in the past as enemies of the state. The stigma does not end with themselves, but also extends to their children and grandchildren. The number of the people affected by the 1965 tragedy, whether murdered, tortured, raped or detained without trial, could reach into the hundreds of thousands.

"I hope the government will rehabilitate all survivors and annul all discriminative laws against the 1965 victims," said Kusnendar, an 83-year-old survivor, during a two-day symposium on 1965 in Jakarta on Tuesday.

He also expressed his concern that there were still state documents that discriminated against them. Presidential Decree No. 28/1975, for example, prevents members or sympathizers of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) who worked as civil servants from receiving their pensions. Meanwhile, Presidential Decree No. 16/1990 prevents former PKI members from working as civil servants or joining the Indonesian Military.

The kidnapping and murder of six Army generals on Sept. 30, 1965, led to a purge of communists and alleged communist sympathizers by the military under the leadership of Soeharto. In the purge, countless thousands were murdered, tortured and arrested without trial. It is estimated that between 500,000 to 1 million people were killed during the cleansing of people with any leftist connections, regardless of their age or level of connection.

"I was beaten up when I arrived at the Budi Kemuliaan penitentiary as I was accused of being involved in the murder of the generals," said Kusnendar, adding that he was arrested on Oct. 10, 1965, in Jakarta, because he was involved in a labor union allegedly affiliated with the PKI.

He was also accused of harboring sympathies with the PKI's youth arm, Pemuda Rakyat. Kusnendar moved from one prison to another, including the Cipinang and Salemba penitentiaries in Jakarta, the Nusakambangan prison island in Central Java and Buru Island in Maluku, often remembered as the "Island of Exiles", in 1969.

Yohanes Winaryo, a 72-year-old survivor, was arrested on Nov. 2, 1965, because of his involvement in the Indonesian Youth and Students Association (IPPI), allegedly affiliated with the PKI.

"We had no affiliation with the PKI as the IPPI just held study-group sessions or sporting events. We even helped the government eradicate illiteracy going door-to-door to the people's houses," he said on Tuesday.

However, Yohanes was forced to work without pay as a stonemason in Central Java until he was released in 1970. Since then, he has been "marked" as a former political prisoner. "Our main demand is rehabilitation. The government should bring back our good name in society. It's more important than compensation," he said.

Because of the stigma attached to them, the 1965 victims had to live hard life. Kusnendar was released in 1978 and reunited with his family in Jakarta. However, he said his wife had to divorce him as a prerequisite to working in the Jakarta Education Agency because of his status as a former political prisoner.

Kusnendar earned a living working as an insurance salesman, a scavenger and a thesis typist in a printing shop. (vps/bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/survivors-of-1965-desperately-seek-rehabilitation.html

Indonesia rules out criminal inquiry of anti-communist purges

New York Times - April 19, 2016

Joe Cochraneapril, Jakarta, Indonesia – Indonesia's security minister said on Monday at a symposium devoted to the mass atrocities committed half a century ago during anti-Communist purges in the country that the government had ruled out a criminal investigation of the period but would consider an unprecedented "expression of regret" to victims and their families.

Luhut B. Pandjaitan, the coordinating minister for political, legal and security affairs, who delivered the opening remarks at the symposium, said the government would, over time, try to answer definitively how hundreds of thousands were killed in state-sponsored violence from 1965 to 1966.

"We'll see what happens after this," Mr. Luhut said after the two-day symposium began in Jakarta, the capital. "We'll study further on what we should do. But the spirit of the government of Indonesia we're basically going to solve the whole thing," he said.

Mr. Luhut, a retired army general, ruled out an apology by the present government to hundreds of thousands of purge survivors who were imprisoned for years without trial or to the descendants of victims whom the state ostracized. But he said the government would be open to official complaints.

"Perhaps its wording would be 'remorse for past events, which were a dark history for this nation, and which we hope will not ever happen again,' " he said of a possible response. "We're still looking for the exact wording."

An acknowledgment would confirm what historians have called one of the worst mass atrocities of the 20th century.

The purges were carried out by soldiers and military-backed civilian, paramilitary and religious groups. Half a million people or more, many of whom had no connection to Communism, are estimated to have been killed, and hundreds of thousands of others were held in detention for years.

The violence, occurring as the Cold War was escalating in Southeast Asia, was set off by a failed uprising within the Indonesian armed forces. An officer-led group kidnapped and killed six army generals beginning on the night of Sept. 30, 1965.

Within days, top commanders had quashed the uprising, which they called an attempted coup orchestrated by the then-powerful Indonesian Communist Party in collaboration with rogue military personnel. In the purges that followed, the victims included intellectuals, ethnic Chinese Indonesians and countless others.

The symposium this week is the first time that a public discussion of the atrocities has been endorsed by the government, which for decades maintained that the bloodshed was justified to save Indonesia from a Communist takeover and which violently suppressed challenges to that narrative.

In 2012, the National Commission on Human Rights, which is independent of the government and organized the current symposium, released a report declaring the purges a gross violation of human rights and demanding a criminal investigation. But neither the government at the time nor that of President Joko Widodo, who assumed office in 2014, has followed up.

Although the main military and civilian architects of the violence are probably all dead, the purges, which led to the removal in 1967 of the country's founding president, Sukarno, remain a highly delicate issue.

Hundreds of police officers backed by armored personnel carriers were on standby outside the hotel in central Jakarta where the symposium opened, in anticipation of possible protests by Islamic groups and paramilitary units that took part in the massacres. No protesters appeared, however.

The 1965-66 events have been extensively researched and documented in reports that contravene the official government narrative that the violence was justified and that those who took part were national heroes.

Sintong Panjaitan, a retired army general who was a young officer during the massacres, also spoke at the symposium and added fuel to the debate by challenging claims that 500,000 or more people were killed. He suggested the number was as low as 80,000. "Where is the evidence?" Mr. Sintong asked.

Joshua Oppenheimer, an American film director, has produced two documentaries about the period that were both nominated for Academy Awards. The fear of reprisals for the films has been strong enough that his Indonesian co-director and crew have remained anonymous out of concerns for their safety.

Mr. Oppenheimer said by phone from Europe on Monday that he supported the symposium's aims, but he warned that Indonesia could not achieve national reconciliation without a truthful accounting of what happened, whether that occurred this week or years from now.

"It would be sort of a tragedy if the government went from one grotesque lie to some slightly less misleading lie, by dismissing the number of victims and saying we should all move forward," Mr. Oppenheimer said. "I think that would deny people any sort of closure and undermine the value of those victims' lives."

Some Indonesian human rights groups declined to participate in the symposium, for fear that it would give the government a quick way to end debate rather than lead to a genuine truth and reconciliation process.

One of the silent protesters is Effendy Saleh, 78, who spent 15 years in prison beginning in 1965 because he was a labor union activist whose group, the military claimed, was affiliated with the Indonesian Communist Party. He was never put on trial and denies any wrongdoing.

"Reconciliation means the 1965 survivors can be accepted and viewed as ordinary citizens," he said. "If people know you as being a '1965 person,' you have nothing."

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/19/world/asia/indonesia-anti-communist-purge-symposium.html

Indonesian activists boycott forum on 1965 anti-communist purge

Channel News Asia - April 19, 2016

Jakarta – Indonesian activists boycotted a state-backed forum on the anti-communist purge of 1965 on Tuesday, a day after a senior minister said the government would not apologise for the one of the darkest periods in Indonesia's history.

Some historians and activists says at least 500,000 people were killed in violence that started in late 1965 after then-general Suharto and the military took power following an abortive communist coup. A million or more people were jailed, suspected of being communists. Successive Indonesian governments have refused to accept the figure.

Events leading up to the coup attempt were the backdrop to C.J. Koch's novel "The Year of Living Dangerously" and 1982 movie of the same name.

The forum marks the first time an Indonesian administration has participated in a national-level discussion about one of the worst episodes of violence since World War Two, but activists questioned the government's commitment to rehabilitating victims and bringing perpetrators to justice.

"This conference is a far cry from what the government should be doing, which is following through with legal processes to address the human rights abuses of 1965," said Haris Azhar of the Commission for Missing Persons, one of several prominent activists who boycotted the two-day event.

Chief Security Minister Luhut Pandjaitan told the Jakarta forum the government was committed to resolving human rights issues but reiterated the official position that it would not issue an official apology.

"Don't even think that the government will apologise for this and that," the Jakarta Post quoted him as saying. "We know what we are doing, that is best for this nation."

Triggered in the middle of the Cold War when the West feared that communism was sweeping through decolonizing Asia, many of the killings were in the populous main island of Java and Bali.

Joshua Oppenheimer, a documentary film maker, whose two films on the topic were nominated for Academy Awards in recent years, called Pandjaitan's comments "profoundly disappointing".

"If the government thinks a two-day symposium in which former military officers deny responsibility and refuse to apologise is an adequate response to a genocide, they will only succeed in insulting the dead and further stigmatizing the survivors," he told Reuters in an email.

But some survivors still hold out hope President Joko Widodo, the country's first leader from outside the political and military establishment, will address rights abuses.

"This government is different from those before," said Abdurrashim, 72, who attended the Jakarta event in the hopes of getting answers over his 12-year detention in the 1960s and 70s for links to the communist party.

"This president is different because he has promised to resolve this in a meaningful and humanitarian way. Hopefully he will carry out his promises." – Reuters

Source: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/indonesian-activists-boyc/2710852.html

1965 Symposium Indonesia's way to face its dark past

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Anton Hermansyah – In a historic move, the Indonesian government has for the first time organized an official event to talk about the massacre of people accused of being communist sympathizers in 1965 and 1966 to seek reconciliation for the country's dark past.

The two-day event, "Dissecting the 1965 tragedy", will look into the period of time in which at least 500,000 people are believed to have been killed and millions imprisoned without trial for allegedly having links to the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).

The aim of the symposium is not to put blame on anyone for the tragic communist purge, head of the Symposium committee retired army general Agus Widjojo said. The event would take a historical approach to reveal the truth about the tragedy so the nation could learn a lesson from it and prevent such a incident from happening again in the future.

The event marked the first time Indonesia has held an open discussion on the tragedy. Survivors, the government, the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), academics, human rights groups have come together to seek national reconciliation.

Previously it was hard to hold discussions on the tragedy, Yuniyanti Chuzaifah, the chairwoman of National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan) recalled. Komnas Perempuan had also faced difficulties in checking on the health conditions of the victims.

"We used to go to West Sumatra on government assignment to check on the condition of the 1965 victims, especially women who had experienced sexual harassment, but we faced obstruction and discrimination from locals," she said on Monday.

Catholic priest and iconic advocate of pluralism Franz Magnis Suseno said the event was important as a process to acknowledge the historical facts and recognize victims of the tragedy. The acknowledgement would also give those who had their passports revoked at the time and have lived in exile since hope of returning to Indonesia, he added.

Survivors demanded the government reveal the truth and deliver justice for the victims, survivor Ilham Aidit said adding that discrimination existed up to the present.

"The important thing for reconciliation is that everybody has a shared understanding, and this will not happen until the truth is revealed from both [the victims and the government]," he said.

Catherine Pandjaitan, the daughter of army general Donald Isaac Pandjaitan, who was murdered on Oct. 1, 1965, said it took her almost 25 years to move on from the tragedy that took her father's life.

"I was 18 and a sophomore student in senior high school when I saw my father get shot in the head, I was stressed and traumatized living in that house, but my mom refused to move because the house had just been built," she told thejakartapost.com on the sidelines of the event.

To help her recover from the tragedy, she traveled around and was a stewardess for German-based airliner Lufthansa for five years before getting married based on the suggestions of former President BJ Habibie whom she called uncle. She returned to Jakarta after she got married and continued her trauma-healing process at her church in Jakarta.

Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan said during his opening remarks that the government would not apologize for the tragedy but emphasized that the government was committed to resolving past human rights abuse cases.

The symposium has received mixed reactions, including protests from a group named Front Pancasila who claim that a resurgent PKI is using the symposium to disseminate communist ideas. (rin)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/1965-symposium-indonesias-way-to-face-its-dark-past.html

Indonesia takes step toward reckoning with '65-66 atrocities

Associated Press - April 19, 2016

Niniek Karmini & Stephen Wright, Jakarta – Indonesia on Monday convened an unprecedented discussion of anti-communist massacres in 1965-66 that brought together survivors and representatives of the military that orchestrated the atrocities.

Protesters who say the two-day conference will help revive communism scuffled with police outside the tightly guarded venue, in a sign of the deep divisions within Indonesia over what rights groups say was one of the worst atrocities of the last century.

Researchers estimate that the military and religious groups killed half a million people in the attacks on communists and sympathizers that ushered in the 32-year rule of the dictator Suharto.

Conference organizer Agus Widjojo, a retired general, said at the meeting that Indonesia is "torn apart" by the massacres and called for the government to establish a commission for truth and reconciliation.

Within Indonesia, widely accepted accounts of the era gloss over the deaths, and descendants of Communist Party members are stigmatized and face legal discrimination that prevents them from holding government jobs.

But the conference, being held at a hotel in Jakarta, the capital, has the backing of government figures and was opened by the Cabinet minister in charge of security and political affairs, Luhut Pandjaitan. Indonesia's attorney general, police chief and justice minister also attended.

The killings began in October 1965, shortly after an apparent abortive coup in which six right-wing generals were killed. Suharto, an unknown major general at the time, filled the power vacuum and blamed the assassinations on Indonesia's Communist Party, which was then the largest outside the Soviet Union and China, with 3 million members.

"Let's open this history together so we can all find out what has been wrong in our national system, why this nation could have the ability to commit mass killings," said Widjojo, whose father was one of the generals killed.

Abdul Rashid, 71, was one of the thousands who escaped death but suffered years of imprisonment without trial or exile in remote corners of Indonesia because of a tenuous connection to the Communist Party.

Rashid's crime was joining a youth group in South Sulawesi province that didn't advertise its links to communists. Four years later, when he was 21, he was seized by troops while teaching an elementary school class, and lost more than a decade of his life to detention and exile.

"I still remember how a dozen military troops pushed into my class," he said in an interview. "They pushed in and pointed their rifles at me in front of my students."

After being freed, a special stamp in his identity card made life difficult, stigmatizing Rashid and his family and making it hard to find work. "This stigma is a too heavy burden," he said. "There are so many innocent people who became victims of a black history. I want this stigma to be ended."

Despite government backing for the conference, Pandjaitan, the security minister, said there would be no government apology to victims and also questioned whether estimates of the death toll were accurate.

"I believe that this meeting will produce positive results to build our nation in the future," he said. "We must be able to create peace with our past. But don't ever think that the government will offer any apology."

Andreas Harsono, Indonesia researcher for Human Rights Watch, said the two-day symposium by itself is not sufficient to come to terms with a buried past.

"At the least, what the government can do is stop discrimination against the victims – the survivors and their children and their grandchildren," he said. Millions of people are affected by a 1981 presidential decree barring communists and their descendants from serving in the police, military or civil service.

Before the conference, rights groups urged the United States to release all of its secret files on the massacres, which could help reveal facts about the period.

Declassified documents held at the National Security Archive of George Washington University show that the US Embassy in Jakarta was aware of extensive killings in Java and other parts of Indonesia and passed lists of communists it had compiled to Indonesia's military. It also organized the supply of radios to the military and secretly gave money to a military-linked group involved in the repression.

At the time, the US viewed Indonesia as a bulwark in its efforts to thwart the influence of the Soviet Union and China in Southeast Asia.

An embassy communication to the Department of State on April 15, 1966, about the number of deaths said: "We frankly do not know whether the real figure is closer to 100,000 or 1,000,000 but believe it wiser to err on the side of the lower estimates, especially when questioned by the press."

Source: http://www.irrawaddy.com/asia/indonesia-takes-step-toward-reckoning-with-65-66-atrocities.html

1965 victims: We don't want communism, just reconciliation

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Anton Hermansyah – Survivors of the 1965 tragedy have called for reconciliation through the revelation of the truth behind the mass killing of members and sympathizers of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and their families. It is believed that at least half a million people were killed.

Speaking at a national symposium in Jakarta, victims of the 1965 anti-communist purge said reconciliation was needed, because, while some of the survivors had forgiven what had happened, others, especially those living outside Java, still experienced discrimination.

"Many people think of reconciliation as: 'Please, forgive us for what has happened in the past'. But actually, the word 'reconciliation' should come from the victims," 1965 survivor Ilham Aidit, son of the late PKI leader DN Aidit, said on Monday.

Ilham explained that proper reconciliation should be based on a revelation of the truth both from the perpetrators' side and the victims' side. The truth revealed could then be passed on to future generations. Ilham called on the government to apologize, not to the PKI, but to the victims of the 1965 tragedy.

Haryono, spokesman of Lembaga Perjuangan Rehabilitasi Korban Orde Baru, an NGO working for the rehabilitation of New Order regime victims, said many people had become victims in the 1965 killings, thus it was important for the government to extend an apology.

"We don't want to re-raise communism in Indonesia. We just ask the President to engage in reconciliation," said Haryono. He added that while Lt. Gen. (Ret) Sintong Pandjaitan had claimed at the same symposium that the number of the 1965 victims was only around 80,000, the victims actually numbered 45 million. Haryono did not provide details on where the figure of 45 million came from.

Former Army Special Forces (Kopassus) member Lt. Gen. (Ret) Sintong Pandjaitan was a regiment commander of the Army Para Commando Regiment (RPKAD), which led the anti-PKI campaign in areas across Indonesia.

At the symposium, Sintong denied that the number of victims killed after the G30S/PKI incident amounted to hundreds of thousands. "It's a lie," the retired military general said as quoted by tempo.co. "Such a lie has tainted our honor as RPKAD members," he went on.

Sintong was referring to the results of an investigation by a fact-finding commission formed by President Soekarno in December 1965 and led by then-Home Minister Maj. Gen. Soemarno. The team concluded that the number of victims was 80,000. President Soekarno was not sure about the investigation results and confided that to a team member, Oei Tjoe Tat. "It is around five to six times higher [than the 80.000 figure]," said Oei, as quoted by Julius Pour in his book Gerakan 30 September.

The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) decided on July 23, 2012, that violence committed after the Sept. 30, 1965, incident amounted to gross human rights violations.

The head of Komnas HAM's 1965-1966 investigation team, Nur Kholis, said the decision was based on the results of an investigation it had conducted since 2008. "Evidence and results from the examination of witnesses found nine crimes belonging to the category of crimes against humanity," said Nur Kholis.

He added the collection and evidence and the examination of 349 witnesses were conducted in areas across Indonesia. "We want to show that the incidents occurred evenly in Indonesia." According to Komnas HAM, the number of those killed in the 1965 anti-communist purge was somewhere between 500,000 and three million people.

Haryono said Indonesia could follow the examples of other Asian countries, such as Cambodia and Vietnam, in reconciliation. People in those two countries could move on from massacres conducted in the past, he said.

President Soekarno's daughter Sukmawati Soekarnoputri also called for reconciliation. "I'm ashamed if we compare our country with Cambodia. They are doing good reconciliation. Prince Norodom Sihanouk is really a nationalist. Until now, some Red Khmer former members can get a position in the government. The massacre site of the Red Khmer regime is now a national monument," she said.

Women's National Committee chairman Yuniati Chuzaifah said the 1965 tragedy not only marked a black chapter in the history of human rights in Indonesia but also created a legacy.

"What happened in May 1998 reflects this. A lesson from what happened in 1965 is that massacres are something allowable in Indonesia. This then triggered other instances of violence, such as the Aceh conflicts, the May 1998 riots and others," she concluded. (ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/1965-victims-we-dont-want-communism-just-reconciliation.html

High hopes set for 1st government-sponsored dialogue on 1965

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

Margareth S. Aritonang and Stefani Ribka – Despite reluctance to address the 1965 tragedy that is thought to have claimed thousands of lives, the government is set to safeguard the first state-sponsored symposium on the controversial subject.

The event will include the thorough examination of the mass killing of Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) members and sympathizers that followed the ousting of first president Sukarno.

The symposium, that starts on Monday, will bring victims, government officials and academics together to look through the country's dark history from various angles in an effort to find comprehensive solutions to the prolonged, unresolved cases of gross human-rights violations that occurred between late 1965 and early 1966.

The leader of the symposium, Let. Gen. (ret) Agus Widjojo, who was recently inaugurated as National Resilience Institute (Lemhanas) governor, is confident that the event will run safely according to plan despite protests from hard-line groups opposed to the initiative.

"We already have the police in charge of security since we know that this is a sensitive issue. We have also collaborated with the office of the coordinating political, legal and security affairs minister, which will certainly help. I'm upbeat that it will run safely," Agus told The Jakarta Post over the weekend.

Similar confidence was also shown by National Police chief Gen. Badrodin Haiti, who was optimistic that his personnel would successfully secure the two-day event. "We are prepared [...] the Jakarta Police will be in charge."

The decision to set up the symposium resulted from months of meetings by a government reconciliation team set up to search for the best pathway, which officials have dubbed "the Indonesian way", for dealing with the 1965 massacre, as well as other cases of gross rights abuses.

Led by Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Pandjaitan, the reconciliation team involves the Law and Human Rights Ministry, the Attorney General's Office and the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM).

Under the supervision of the Presidential Advisory Board (Wantimpres), the team has been organizing meetings and discussions with various stakeholders, from human-rights campaigners and academics to individuals who have suffered themselves.

Although it is the first gathering officially sponsored by the government, it is not the first attempt to publicly discuss the matter. Various groups have initiated gatherings aimed at recalling and reviewing the 1965 incident, but many of them were forcibly cancelled due to pressure from radical groups that use the Pancasila to defend their actions.

One such incident was the recent forced dissolution of a meeting for survivors of the mass murder, mostly people over 60 years old, organized by the 1965 Murder Victims' Research Foundation (YPKP 65) in Cipanas, West Java. Pressure from hundreds of Islam Defenders Front (FPI) members and the youth organization Pemuda Pancasila forced the event to stop.

Prior to that, the FPI and like-minded groups had insisted on shutting down many meetings and art performances seen as encouraging the rise of communism.

On Saturday, anti-PKI hard-liner, Front Pancasila, threatened to deploy followers to Hotel Aryaduta, the symposium venue, in an attempt to stop it from happening over a suspicion that it aims to lawfully reinstate the PKI.

The organization spokesperson Alfian Tanjung claimed that 90 percent of the gathering's 200 invitees were affiliated with the once largest political party in the country.

No matter what, Lemhanas governor Agus, whose father, Gen. Sutoyo Siswomiharjo was killed during the initial Sept. 30 attack in 1965, rebutted such suggestions. "How can they move past that opinion if they refuse to discuss it together? It's time for us to leave stereotyping behind."

The scheduled symposium has immediately attracted enthusiasm from survivors and rights campaigners who are looking forward to the results of the event.

Activist Bedjo Untung, himself a victim, said that 17 survivors from the 1965 Murder Victims' Research Foundation would attend the discussion. "We are happy as this is the first national discussion where we have the chance to speak for ourselves".

The event is expected to result in recommendations being made to President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo who is scheduled to make an official announcement next month regarding the government's stance on the reconciliation process.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/high-hopes-set-1st-govt-sponsored-dialogue-1965.html

Government will not apologize for 1965 massacre: Luhut

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

The government has stressed that there are no plans for an official apology for the 1965 anti-communist purge, an official said Monday.

Coordinating Minister for Politics, Legal and Security Affairs Luhut Pandjaitan made the statement during his opening remarks at the two-day National Symposium titled "Dissecting the 1965 tragedy" being held in Jakarta April 18-19.

"We are not that stupid. Don't even think that the government will apologize for this and that. We know what we are doing that is best for this nation," Luhut said in his speech at the opening of the two-day symposium, as quoted by Kompas.com.

The government has been through a complicated process, he continued, adding that there have been many meetings for the realization of the national symposium.

The symposium has received various reactions, including accusations that the government was influenced by the now-defunct Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).

Luhut said the government is serious in its intentions to resolve the cases of human rights abuses, especially the case of the 1965 killings. "The process of getting here has not been easy. We have conducted several meetings regarding the running of the symposium. As in accordance with the desire of the government, the human rights issues must be resolved," said Luhut. (dan)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/government-will-not-apologize-for-1965-massacre-luhut.html

Indonesia rules out apology to victims at state-endorsed talks on 1965 massacres

Sydney Morning Herald - April 18, 2016

Jewel Topsfield and Karuni Rompies, Jakarta – Indonesia's chief security minister said the country must make peace with its past but ruled out a government apology to the victims of the 1965 anti-communist purge at the first ever state-sanctioned discussions on the mass killings.

Luhut Panjaitan – one of President Joko Widodo's most trusted ministers – said the two-day symposium reflected the government's intention to resolve past human rights abuses.

The massacre of at least half a million people with suspected leftist leanings in 1965 and 1966 remains an intensely sensitive and controversial topic in Indonesia.

Last year an international writers' festival in Bali was forced to cancel sessions on the dark chapter in Indonesia's history, after officials warned the entire festival could be shut down if they went ahead.

"The process that brought us here today is not an easy one," Mr Panjaitan said. "We have to make peace with our past. But the government will not extend an apology."

Human rights advocates are hopeful the symposium will lead to a public hearing process, so Indonesians can hear firsthand accounts from survivors and descendants of victims.

"This is an essential element of an effective accountability process," said Human Rights Watch executive director Kenneth Roth. "Dozens of countries around the world have had truth commissions shed light on past atrocities, issues that are always difficult matters to address. Why not Indonesia?"

The 1965 pogroms were triggered by the assassination of six army generals on September 30, in a coup blamed on the now defunct Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). An estimated 500,000 to one million people labelled "communists" were killed and hundreds of thousands were detained without trial.

The head of the symposium is Agus Widjojo, a retired army general whose father was one of the generals shot in 1965. He said the purpose of the symposium was reconciliation and not a court of justice to ascertain who was right and wrong.

In 2012 the Indonesian national human rights commission, Komnas HAM, recommended a criminal inquiry and the establishment of an ad hoc human rights court to try the perpetrators. This has not been followed up by the government on the grounds that many of the perpetrators have died, witnesses can't be found and the large amount of time that has passed.

Mr Agus said the symposium was different because all affected parties, including the military and survivors, had been invited. "This is the mental revolution our president is talking about," he said. "A mental revolution where we have to listen to the things we don't want to hear, where we we have to listen to things we regard as myth."

Many Indonesians were taught at school that communists were bloodthirsty atheists and that their defeat was pivotal to the survival of Indonesia.

The Indonesian national human rights commission has also written to the Obama administration, asking it to release classified documents relating to the killings. It has been alleged that the CIA provided names of alleged communists to the Indonesian government.

"We want to learn more about about the working-level involvement between the US government and the killers in 1965," said Mr Roth.

US ambassador Robert Blake said the US welcomed the state-sponsored dialogue to shed more light on 1965. "We have a process already where we routinely declassify documents after 25 years," he said. "In general the Obama administration is very committed to transparency and openness and I think a lot of these documents already have been released."

Source: http://www.smh.com.au/world/indonesia-rules-out-apology-to-victims-at-stateendorsed-talks-on-1965-massacres-20160418-go96fq.html

Tensions flare at Jakarta discussion on 1965-66 massacres

Jakarta Globe - April 18, 2016

Jakarta – Tensions flared during a discussion on Indonesia's 1965-66 anti-communist purges on Monday (18/04), with the major point of contention revolving around how the government should address what has been dubbed the worst mass killing of the 20th century.

The military-backed massacre resulted in the death of hundreds of thousands of suspected communist sympathizers across that archipelago and saw millions more imprisoned without trial.

More than 200 people, ranging from senior government officials, retired generals, academics, human rights activists, and survivors of the massacres gathered for the two-day National Symposium on the 1965 Tragedy in Central Jakarta.

"This symposium will hopefully put an end to the 50-year-old controversy [on what happened in 1965]," chief organizer Suryo Susilo said in a statement. He said the discussion would try to reveal what happened from all perspectives, including those of the survivors and those accused of orchestrating the killing.

"It is now time to dissect all [the different views] together," Suryo said. "So we can view the past proportionally [...] A great nation must formulate ways to move on based on truth and justice."

President Joko Widodo has promised to resolve past cases of gross human rights abuses, including the 1965-66 massacre, but activists pointed out that the so-called reconciliation efforts his administration are seeking could derail that promise and provide yet further impunity to the perpetrators in the tragedy.

Joko's administration has also refused to issue a formal apology for the millions of people imprisoned for years without trial simply for being suspected of sympathizing with the now defunct Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and for the countless cases of discrimination they have had to endure upon their release.

During the discussion, Coordinating Legal and Security Minister Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan defended the government's move to settle the case out of court, saying that prosecuting people responsible for the killings, some of whom are now the country's top political elites, "is not easy."

"But the government realizes that we need to resolve past human rights cases. We see the 1965 tragedy as a gateway to resolving other cases," he said, as quoted by Tempo.co.

Luhut praised the importance of this week's discussion, promising that the event would not suffer the same fate as countless other discussions and movie screenings that have been forcibly banned due to security concerns and "pressure from members of the public."

Luhut also downplayed the scale of the massacre, which according to some estimates resulted in the death of between 500,000 and 1 million people. "There weren't that many victims," the minister said.

Retired general, Sintong Panjaitan, who was a member of the Army's Commando Regiment (RPKAD) in 1965, tasked with hunting down PKI leaders, also disputed the figure saying that only 80,000 people were killed.

"It's true that the RPKAD was deployed to Central Java and that we were assisted by [the Muslim groups] Ansor Youth and Muhammadiyah. But we were only after [PKI] figureheads," he told the same discussion, as quoted by Antara news agency.

The retired general claimed that those who were not communist leaders were released. The remark was immediately met with jeers from activists and survivors of the tragedy.

Human rights lawyer Todung Mulya Lubis said disagreement over the true number of casualties must not overshadow the fact that such atrocity did occur.

Todung also highlighted the fact that many people fled the country in fear of being targeted, while students sent abroad to study by former President Sukarno, a socialist, were barred from returning to the country for years. Millions of former prisoners and their families also endured discrimination and were prevented from holding certain jobs.

"These are gross human rights violations," he said, as quoted by Tempo. "It doesn't matter that [the case] is resolved through judicial process or not, history will be history. The truth must be revealed and then we can talk about reconciliation, rehabilitation or compensation."

Source: http://jakartaglobe.beritasatu.com/news/tensions-flare-jakarta-discussion-1965-66-massacres/

Indonesia's 1965 victims remember fear

Australian Associated Press - April 18, 2016

Lauren Farrow and Heru Rahadi – For years Svetlana Nyoto lived with the fear that someone would find out who she was.

"After my father went missing, they arrested my mother. I was then nurtured by a kind family who took care of all of us, seven siblings. I thought I must be kind to those who had been kind to us by taking care of us, by not revealing who we are," she said on Monday.

She is one of thousands of survivors of one of the darkest chapters in Indonesia's history, when at least 500,000 so-called communists and their sympathisers are believed to have been killed in state-sanctioned purges between 1965 and 1966. Now for the first time the government has supported talks on the subject, in a bid to get the country to confront these shadows.

Ms Nyoto was the daughter of Lukman Njoto, also known as Nyoto, one of then-president Sukarno's ministers and a deputy of the Indonesian Community Party.

Speaking at the first day of the symposium in Jakarta on Monday, Ms Nyoto said that during 1965 she, her father, her mother and her six siblings were detained in a military complex before being released.

And then one day in March 1966, her father was kidnapped and never seen again. "The hardest burden I had to bear is that I had to hide my identity. I could not use my own name."

Indonesia's Security Minister Luhut Panjaitan said the country must make peace with its past but made it clear the government would not be issuing an apology. "(It) never crossed the government's mind that we will ask for forgiveness," he told reporters on Monday.

Human Rights Watch executive director Kenneth Roth last week described the killings as "one of the most horrendous crimes of our era", saying it represented a terrible precedent in Indonesia of dealing with differences through mass murder. "Sadly, that's a precedent that because Indonesia has not really addressed it, it remains an option."

Human rights groups have previously called on the US to declassify files that they say could show how the mass killings were planned. US ambassador Robert Blake on Monday welcomed the symposium, saying he hoped it would cast more light on the issue.

But Mr Blake said he couldn't comment on what documents human rights groups wanted, adding: "We have a process in place already where we routinely declassify documents after 30 years.... In general we very much support openness and transparency."

Source: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/indonesias-1965-victims-remember-fear/news-story/8585aa05af9f2e768f64fe20e1e83424

High school teacher introduces alternative narratives on 1965 tragedy

Jakarta Post - April 17, 2016

Elly Burhaini Faizal – A high school history teacher in Batam, Riau Islands, has brought alternative narratives of the 1965 to 1966 communist purge into class as a way to reveal the truth behind the mass killings done during those years.

"In school the lesson materials of our history must reveal the truth about the state's failure in the past because history itself should represent the country," said Diah Wahyuningsih, a 42-year-old history teacher at state senior high school SMAN 4 Batam, on Friday.

"Don't deceive the people any more. The young generation is not as stupid as they might think because they now could find everything on the internet," she said.

Diah said she had held discussions about the 1965 tragedy and its impacts on society in her classes. She even asked her students to together watch Joshua Oppenheimer's documentary film The Look of Silence, which was released in December 2014.

Diah claimed her grandfather had been a spokesperson for former president Sukarno's Indonesian National Party (PNI). However, she said, her grandfather was murdered in West Sumatra during the 1965 tragedy.

The kidnapping and killing of six Indonesian Army generals in Sept. 30, 1965, which was suspected to have been orchestrated by the now defunct Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), led to an attacks against the PKI by the Military under the leadership of Soeharto.

Following the attacks, scores were arrested, tortured and murdered. It is estimated that between 500,000 to 1 million people were killed during the cleansing of people suspected of having leftist connections, regardless of their age or level of 'connection'.

Survivors and relatives of the victims have also been stigmatized and face discrimination to this day. Moreover, the perpetrators of the mass killings have never been revealed.

The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) and the Presidential Advisory Board (Wantimpres) are set to hold a two-day symposium on April 18 and 19 in Jakarta to discuss and bring recommendations on the 1965 to 1966 mass killings. The symposium will involve academics, human rights activists, 1965 victims, politicians and representatives of several government bodies. (vps/ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/17/high-school-teacher-introduces-alternative-narratives-on-1965-tragedy.html

1965 symposium must not become fig leaf, activists warn

Jakarta Post - April 16, 2016

Human rights activists have warned the government not to use next week's national symposium on the 1965-1966 mass killings as a way to force a one-sided reconciliation that upholds the impunity of the guilty.

"The symposium must not be used as a justification by the state to force a reconciliation," Ahmad Fanani Rosyidi, a researcher at the Setara Institute, said in a discussion in Jakarta on Friday.

"The coalition of civilians and victims believes that the reconciliation initiated by the government is misguided. Reconciliation can only be a result of the truth-revealing process. Hence, without revealing the truth, we will never understand who are the perpetrators and the victims who need to be rehabilitated," Ahmad noted.

The kidnapping and eventual murder of six Indonesian Army generals on Sept. 30, 1965, led to a purge by the military under the leadership of Soeharto of the now defunct Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). The attack also led to mass killings, leaving at least 500,000 victims across the country; the perpetrators have enjoyed impunity since.

The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has launched its own investigation into the case, but its recommendations have never been followed up by the Attorney General's Office (AGO).

On April 18-19, Komnas HAM and the Presidential Advisory Board (Wantimpres) are to hold a symposium in Jakarta on the 1965-1966 mass killings, involving academics, human rights activists, victims, politicians and the representatives of several government bodies.

Meanwhile, the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) has also questioned the essence of the symposium, responding to a previous statement by Agus Widjoyo, one of the committee heads, on Wednesday that the event would not aim to determine who was right and who was wrong.

"The symposium risks becoming a fig leaf for the government," Kontras impunity monitoring division head Feri Kusuma said on Friday. "We don't oppose the symposium, but we want to ensure that the event promotes the rights of the victims."

The first day of the national symposium will be divided into four sessions: on a multicultural and pluralist society; on the political dynamics before 1965; on the impacts of the 1965-1966 mass killings on humanity and psychosocial culture; and on the pattern of power and social dynamics after the event. The discussion will involve sources including Limas Sutanto, Asvi Warman Adam, Todung Mulya Lubis and Salim Said.

On the second day, there will be another four sessions: on the construction of memories of the 1965 tragedy; on Indonesian society in the reformation era; on Indonesian society after 1998; on and the future of the society. The discussion will hear from sources including Marsudi Suhud, Ifdhal Kasim, Galuh Wandita, Yunianti Chuzaifah and Putu Oka Sukanta. (vps/bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/16/1965-symposium-must-not-become-fig-leaf-activists-warn.html

Indonesia calls a symposium on the 1965-66 killings, but may not be ready for the

Time - April 16, 2016

Yenni Kwok – A half-century after at least half a million people were killed in a brutal pogrom against suspected communists and communist sympathizers, Indonesia is still unsure about whether it is ready to glance at let alone actually face up to one of the darkest chapters in its history.

On Monday, Indonesia's Chief Security Minister Luhut Panjaitan will open a two-day, government-backed national symposium in Jakarta on the 1965-66 killings. Supported by the National Human Rights Commission, the event is expected not only to discuss the killings but also plans to facilitate the first meeting between members of the Indonesian military, which led the anticommunist persecution, and survivors of the atrocity.

An estimated 500,000 to 1 million people some say even millions perished as the army, paramilitary groups and religious organizations hunted down members of the Indonesian Communist Party (known as PKI, which was blamed for the deaths of six army generals), suspected leftists, supporters and their families. Ethnic Chinese were targeted too because of the party's close ties with Beijing. In addition, hundreds of thousands of political prisoners languished behind bars or toiled in far-flung gulags.

Among the architects of the conference are Sidarto Danusubroto, a member of the presidential advisory committee, and Agus Widjojo, a retired general whose father was one of the high-ranking army officials who, according to the official version, were allegedly killed by the PKI.

"It is to guarantee that we will not repeat in the future what had happened forgive but not forget," said Agus, co-founder of Forum Silaturahmi Anak Bangsa, an umbrella organization that seeks to facilitate dialogue and reconciliation between children of ex-PKI members, the families of army generals killed in 1965 and other victims of conflicts.

However, the symposium's focus on reconciliation, while remaining reticent on the facts of what happened, has sparked criticisms from human-rights activists who have long called for a full and frank approach to the massacre on the part of the state.

Nursyahbani Katjasungkana, a human-rights lawyer and activist who was one of the coordinators of the International People's Tribunal on the 1965 massacre, held in the Hague last year, welcomes the symposium on one hand, hoping that it "will facilitate a national dialogue" toward reconciliation. "But," she adds, "finding the truth is a prerequisite."

Days before the national conference, two human-rights groups, the New York City-based Human Rights Watch and the Jakarta-based Kontras, made a joint call for the U.S. to release secret files on the 1965 massacres. "We want to know the working level involvement between the U.S. government and the killers in 1965," HRW executive director Kenneth Roth told journalists in the Indonesian capital on Wednesday.

Although the fall of authoritarian President Suharto in 1998 has unleashed a certain level of openness on the massacre, it remains a controversial topic. It is not uncommon for any activists seeking to address the human-rights violations of the 1965-66 victims and survivors to be harassed and intimidated by Islamic hard-liners or members of the security forces.

This was what happened to one group that is scheduled to take part in the national seminar next week. The Research Foundation on the Victims of the 1965/66 Killings (YPKP 65) was forced to relocate its preparatory meeting for the symposium on Thursday following harassment by Islamic hard-liners, said YPKP 65 chairman Bejo Untung. He also said military intelligence interrogated the group's members before they even arrived in Jakarta.

"The government or the state, especially the military, shouldn't repress or intimidate us," Bejo told online radio station Portal KBR. "We are very disappointed because until today, the victims of the 1965 [tragedy] are threatened whenever they hold a meeting."

Source: http://time.com/4295474/indonesia-1965-1966-killings-pki-massacre-reconciliation/

Feminism & women's rights

137 years after Kartini, it's time to end child marriage

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Missiyah – For hundreds of years, women have been struggling to seize their rights, through organizing themselves and galvanizing a women's movement to push for better government policies, among other things.

However, many women, particularly those from poor rural families, are still vulnerable to dropping out of school, giving them no other option but to settle for work in the informal sector, leaving them exposed to violence.

Denied of protection and security, they can work up to 15 hours a day for only meager wages and are still expected to do household work. The 2013 Social Barometer Survey revealed women are 1.5 times more likely to earn wages lower than Rp 500,000 (US$38.07) per month, compared with men.

Given this situation, what is the significance of Indonesia's position as the only permanent ASEAN member in the G-20, and the optimism that it will be one of the world's seven largest economies in the next ten years?

Amid the continued economic growth and rapid development, women remain poor. One factor that perpetuates this cycle among women is child marriage.

One woman in East Lombok, for instance, studied only until second grade and was married at 15. Her two children fared a little better; yet the cycle of poverty may continue for them as with her earnings as a vendor, she only managed to send them to junior high school. As a single parent she tried to avoid the local stigma against widows, and remarried four times. All marriages failed, she said, owing to unfaithful husbands and domestic violence.

This was just one story shared in sessions of Sekolah Perempuan (informal Women's School, facilitated by NGOs) which have been held in Pangkajene islands in South Sulawesi, Gresik in East Java, Jakarta, Kupang in East Nusa Tenggara, Padang in West Sumatra, and other areas.

Unlike these poor women the heroine RA Kartini, born on April 21, 1879, was from a noble family; but was similarly unable to go against her parents, and was forced to enter a polygamous marriage. Since her teenage years she had already tried to resist what was then seen as the inevitable fate for girls, and continued to fight for girls' right to education.

According to a 2014 World Bank study, inequality in Indonesia has worsened and it is girls who are bearing the brunt. Children from poor families fall back into poverty as 71 percent of them are likely to drop out of high school. An earlier 2007 study on education by E-net for Justice, a coalition of NGOs, already showed the dropout rate in poor families reached 77.85 percent.

When the Millennium Development Goals expired in 2015, Indonesia had failed to meet the goal of reducing maternal mortality to 108 per 100,000 live births – which were traced to a high rate of child marriage, as well as poor access to safe pregnancy and delivery services.

Child marriage here remains widespread; we rank second among Southeast Asian countries in terms of the number of early marriages. According to the 2010 Basic Health Research, child marriage in Indonesia accounts for 46.7 percent of all marriages.

However, apart from failing to attract wide attention, 137 years after Kartini, whose birthday we commemorate each year as Kartini Day, we also see resistance against the fight to end child marriage. Under the pretext of culture, religion and morality, the issue is conveniently swept under the carpet. The state continues to endorse child marriage through the 1974 Marriage Law, which sets the legal minimum marrying age for girls at 16, while it is 19 for boys.

A Constitutional Court ruling last year turned down a judicial review request of the 1974 Marriage Law. Though advocates for females had urged the minimum marrying age be increased to 18, the law was upheld by the Court even though child marriage largely leads to disruption of the constitutional right to education.

The Court said an increased marriage age would not guarantee a reduction in health problems and divorce. It disregarded Article 31 of the Constitution, which states, "every citizen should receive mandatory basic education and the government must take responsibility for its financing".

Marriage of children under 18 also flouts the National Development Priorities that explicitly stipulates 12 years of compulsory basic education. Apart from violating the 2003 education law, child marriage contravenes the 1999 Human Rights Law, and the 1984 ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.

It also violates the 2002 law on child protection that states that a child is anyone under the age of 18, and other international commitments, as well as the recently adopted Sustainable Development Goals.

If President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo's mental revolution aims to create a new life for the nation, changing mindsets and cultural and political practices are a must to reconstruct a new life for children, especially girls, as the foundation of our future. Let's not leave half of tomorrow's generation stuck in the trap of poverty. Child marriage must immediately be ended by transforming mindsets and shedding conservative views that legitimize the practice.

It is now time for the House of Representatives to revise the outdated 1974 marriage law and the education law to guarantee children's right to education through the 12-year compulsory education policy. Such a move would be a decisive step to break the chains of poverty in Indonesia.

[The writer is executive director of Kapal Perempuan (Women's Ship) Institute in Jakarta.]

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/137-years-after-kartini-it-s-time-end-child-marriage.html

Feminism in the spotlight as Indonesia celebrates Kartini Day

Sydney Morning Herald - April 20, 2016

Jewel Topsfield, Jakarta – On April 21, Indonesian school girls will don the kebaya – a traditional blouse-dress – and firms will offer discounts to females, as the nation pays tribute to the woman widely regarded as its first feminist.

The story of Raden Ajeng Kartini, born in 1879 into an aristocratic Javanese family during the Dutch colonial era, is a seemingly contradictory one. Kartini staunchly opposed polygamy but married a man with three wives at the behest of her ailing father.

She died after giving birth to her first child but was appropriated by the New Order regime (former president Suharto's 32-year dictatorship) as the archetypal mother. She established a school for girls and dreamed of women's emancipation but Kartini Day, held every April 21, is largely celebrated with fashion shows and cooking competitions.

"To be honest I'm a little bit allergic to Kartini Day," says one of Indonesia's leading feminists, Julia Suryakusuma. "I don't want to be judgmental about someone who lived so long ago and is dead, but she went against her principles. We shouldn't be focused on Kartini, we should be focused on gender equality."

Ms Suryakusuma is a feminist pioneer in Indonesia. She coined the phrase "state ibuism", an ideology that defined women as wives and mothers during the New Order.

Ms Suryakusuma says state ibuism was epitomised in Dharma Wanita, a state-sanctioned organisation for civil servants' wives, whose positions within the organisation mirrored their husbands'.

Her thesis – the first gender analysis of the New Order – was later published as a book and is taught at universities throughout the world. Some gains in women's rights have been made since the fall of Suharto.

"At the beginning of reformasi (the post-Suharto era) the rape of many Chinese women led to the formation of Komnas Perempuan (the National Commission of Violence Against Women)," Ms Suryakusuma says.

She is inspired by Islamic feminists, including Kiai Haji Husein Muhammad, a Muslim scholar who has written a book about feminist reinterpretations of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence).

"It's very important for feminism to infiltrate religious organisations. If you look at western feminists they are always shouting from the rooftops but we have to go under the radar. It's not a different feminism, it's a different strategy," Ms Suryakusuma says. "Western feminists don't understand what being subtle is. We have to work with Islam. Islam is not the enemy, patriarchy is."

Ms Suryakusuma says women's issues of concern to her now include poverty, violence against women, workplace discrimination, the exploitation of female migrant workers overseas (many of them domestic workers who take care of other people's children for years to support their own, whom they almost never see) and child marriage.

This month Lady Fast 2016, a cultural event held by female artist group Kolektif Betina, was disbanded by police and Islamic organisations in Yogyakarta.

"People came and insisted we stop all activities, reasoning we were bad girls because we dressed in miniskirts, had tattoos etc," says Mila Deva from Kolektif Betina. "There was no dialogue whatsoever between us and the attackers, they just came and told us what to do."

The feminist movement in Indonesia was only decades old, Ms Mila says, and some Indonesians still hold the misconception that feminism was an attempt by women to dominate men.

"Indonesian society is not so open, therefore the way feminism is addressed in Indonesia is through cultural performance. Some friends do it through legal advocacy which is also good."

However Ms Mila believes awareness of women's rights to education and health is growing in Indonesia. "More and more employers now understand that women need to take maternity leave."

Ms Mila believes Kartini Day is still relevant in Indonesia. "However I hope it is not just celebrated but taken to a higher level with concrete actions." – With Karuni Rompies

Source: http://www.smh.com.au/world/feminism-in-the-spotlight-as-indonesia-celebrates-kartini-day-20160420-goalp2.html

Freedom of information & press

Arrests, restrictions still a problem as Indonesia's press freedom worsens

Jakarta Globe - April 21, 2016

Jakarta – Indonesia is ranked 130th out of 180 countries in the 2016 World Press Freedom Index surveyed by Paris-based international media freedom organization Reporters Without Borders (RSF).

The index, released on Wednesday (20/04), indicates that media freedom in Indonesia is getting worse with the intensity of attacks on freedom and independence of the press rising from a rate of 40.75 last year to 41.72.

Indonesia ranks above Thailand which has a press attack rating of 44.75 and is ranked 136th, Malaysia, 46.75 and 146th, and Singapore, 52.95 and 154th.

In the report, RSF noted that the Indonesian government under the leadership of President Joko Widodo has continued serious media freedom violations, including blocking access to West Papua, which it describes as "an information black hole."

"Journalists and fixers trying to work there are liable to be arrested.

The problem is compounded by Indonesia's visa laws, which discriminates against foreign journalists," the report states.

The report also notes that at the same time, many poorly paid journalists accept bribes in return for positive coverage.

Finland still tops the world with a press attack ranking of just 8.59, which it has had for the past five consecutive years, followed by the Netherlands, 8.76 and Norway, 8.79 in third position.

The index also showed that Europe remains to be the freest continent for journalists to work in with an average score of 19.8, followed by Africa at a distant second on 36.9.

North America – a region where violence against journalists is on the rise – recorded a press attack rating of 37.1, so dropped from second to third place this year.

The regions of Asia and Eastern Europe/Central Asia follow with index scores of 43.8 and 48.4 respectively. Meanwhile, North Africa/Middle East is still the region where journalists are most subjected to constraints of every kind with a score of 50.8.

Published annually since 2002, RSF's World Press Freedom Index has been an important advocacy tool based on the principle of emulation between nations.

The data is compiled by means of a questionnaire in 20 languages completed by experts all over the world. This qualitative analysis is combined with quantitative data on abuses and acts of violence against journalists during the period evaluated.

Source: http://jakartaglobe.beritasatu.com/news/arrests-restrictions-still-problem-indonesias-press-freedom-worsens/

Political parties & elections

Soldiers, police 'must quit to contest polls'

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2016

Human rights watchdog Imparsial has renewed its opposition to a proposal that active military and police personnel be granted the right to contest regional elections without having to resign from active duty.

Imparsial executive director Al Araf insisted that active military and police personnel continue to be obliged to resign their positions if they wanted to run in local elections.

"It should be borne in mind that soldiers and police officers have an esprit de corps. If they remain active officers when contesting regional elections, there's a risk they'll exert force in order to swing the vote in their favor," Al Araf said.

Military and police personnel's authorization to use weapons could see violence flare up during campaigns, especially if more than one were contesting a given election, he added.

Last week, House of Representatives Commission II overseeing regional affairs held a consultation with the Constitutional Court seeking approval of a revision to the Regional Elections Law.

Some commission members spoke in favor of omitting a clause in the proposed revision that requires both House members and active military and police personnel to quit their posts prior to contesting elections; the existing stipulation applies only to military and police personnel.

However, the court maintained that the requirement should equally apply to House legislators.

Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI) director of advocacy Bahrain supported the court's stance, saying that scrapping the clause would contravene universal principles of democracy.

"The police's duty is to guard ballot boxes during election times. If a candidate came from the police, how could we be sure he wasn't manipulating the ballots, given that those guarding the boxes are his colleagues?" Bahrain asked.

Equally, he added, House members should resign their seats if they want to run in local elections. "If you're already a member of the House, do you really need to be a mayor too?" Bahrain asked, noting that legislators should in theory be of higher caliber than regents or mayors.

Al Araf, on the other hand, said the requirement, while vital for police and military personnel, could be scrapped for House members.

"It's up to the House itself to decide whether members should be exempt from the clause. The most important thing is that the requirement be imposed strictly on military and police officers," he said.

"We fought for 32 years to expel the military from political activity. Do they want to go back to the [New Order] era again, when the leadership of the state and key government positions were all held by figures connected with the military?" he asked.

Failure to comply with the requirement, he added, would furthermore contravene laws on the Indonesian Military (TNI) and the National Police. (wnd)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/22/soldiers-police-must-quit-contest-polls.html

Incumbents should resign before seeking re-election: Observers

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

As part of efforts to reduce corruption at the regional level, activists have urged lawmakers to require incumbent local leaders to resign their posts before seeking re-election.

Indonesian Legal Aid Institute Foundation (YLBHI) advocacy director Bahrain said in Jakarta on Thursday that incumbents frequently used regional funds to finance their re-election campaigns.

"If they don't resign, it's easy for them to use state funds to influence voters," Bahrain warned, noting the frequent arrests of local leaders for such misuse of state money.

The House of Representatives is deliberating a revision of the 2015 regional election law, but has yet to reach an agreement on whether regional head candidates should be required to resign in order to stand again.

The current law obliges legislators, soldiers, police officers and civil servants to submit a resignation letter if they want to contest an election, in line with a judicial review decided by the Constitutional Court in July 2015.

Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem) researcher Heroik Pratama agreed with Bahrain, saying the requirement was necessary to ensure equality between incumbents and new candidates.

"Incumbents could exploit civil servants to benefit them in the election. As such, with this proposal from the House [to scrap the resignation requirement], how can we create a fair competition for all?" he asked. (vps/bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/incumbents-should-resign-before-seeking-re-election-observers.html

Golkar to collect billions from each chairman candidate

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

Erika Anindita Dewi – The steering committee of the Golkar Party's extraordinary national congress (Munaslub) has decided to collect contributions of Rp 5 billion (US$379,000) to Rp 10 billion from each member running for the party's chairmanship.

Steering committee chairman Nurdin Halid said the contributions were part of the requirements each applicant had to meet, and this requirement would be applied strictly to all would-be chairman candidates once they passed the verification process.

"The decision was based on our calculations on the amount of money needed to cover activities directly related to their nomination, such as the organizing of candidate debates, campaign activities and transportation costs," Nurdin told journalists on the sidelines of a committee meeting at the party's headquarters in Slipi, West Jakarta, on Wednesday.

Nurdin added that the donation served as a "fence" to prevent chairman candidates from money politics, such as giving money for transportation, accommodation and pocket money to participants of the Munaslub.

He further said that the committee had initially prepared five models of contribution. The donation of Rp 5-10 billion chosen at the plenary meeting was the fifth option. The high of the donation was based on the estimation that there would be six to nine prospective candidates.

Aside from the collection of candidate contributions, spending on the Munaslub would be shouldered by the party's central executive board, so that the congress could run smoothly and "clean". In return for the paid contributions, Golkar plans to set up stages for the chairman candidates to campaign at events to be attended by their supporters.

Nurdin said Golkar would need approximately Rp 85 billion to hold the national congress that had been postponed to May 27 in Bali.

The senior Golkar politician explained that money politics had always been related closely to pocket money payments for congress participants. The pocket money always accounted for the largest portion of overall conference costs.

Nurdin said the steering committee's decision on the contribution fund was only a recommendation so far. He added that the party's central executive board had the final say on whether or not to apply the recommendation.

Azis Syamsuddin, one of the party's chairman candidates, refused to comment on the candidate contribution requirement and said he would wait for the results of the party's central board plenary meeting on the recommendation.

"I haven't seen the recommendation. This is the result of the steering committee's meeting. There will be a central board plenary meeting. We'll wait for that," Azis told thejakartapost.com on Wednesday evening.

Another chairman candidate, Idrus Marham, called on all parties to respect the steering committee's recommendation, which he called a "political creation".

Idrus noted hat the committee's decision would still be discussed at Golkar's central executive board's plenary meeting, the highest-level decision-making forum in the party. "As to whether there are acceptable arguments for this political creation, we will wait for the explanation at the plenary meeting," Idrus said on Wednesday evening.

Golkar has so far gathered donations of Rp 126.15 million and S$3,000 in the week from April 13 to April 20 for the Bali congress.

Steering committee member Andi Sinulingga said on Wednesday the donation idea had been initiated by the party's younger generation, who aimed to ensure that the upcoming Munaslub could be an independent event free from business interests.

Andi said the donation fund would not be used for candidate campaigns, as those would be covered by different donations. (ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/golkar-to-collect-billions-from-each-chairman-candidate.html

Internet & social media

Country awakens to gaping digital divide

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

Despite the rising number of internet users, a digital gulf is dividing the archipelago with wildly unequal access, speed and proficiency between more developed western and poor eastern regions. The Jakarta Post's Dylan Amirio, Pandaya, Nethy Dharma Somba and Bambang Muryanto take a close look at the issue.

A heartwarming picture of a taxi driver and an app motorcycle taxi driver sitting side by side on a quiet roadside intently looking at the screen of a smartphone went viral on social media after their protesting colleagues engaged in brawls that turned Jakarta's streets into a battlefield in March.

Thousands of conventional taxi drivers took to the streets demanding the government ban the operation of internet-based ride-hailing app services such as Grab, GoJek and Uber, which have established a considerable presence as more reliable, cheaper alternatives.

Conventional taxi drivers have complained about a steep drop in their incomes following the arrival of their technology-savvy competitors, which they accuse of operating illegally but enjoying government privileges despite not paying taxes.

Giving off a vibe of peace, the photograph tells a lot of things that the drivers may not be aware of: discrepancies in the technological proficiency among them as the internet revolutionizes life in this digital era, including the way people earn money.

The unstoppable advancement of digital technology has caught people with a "conventional" mindset like the taxi drivers and state policymakers alike by storm. After the protest, Bluebird – Jakarta's largest taxi company – vowed to upgrade its online service, which used to be confined to BlackBerry users, as a strategy to compete with its internet-based competitors. The government immediately promised to revise Law No. 22/2009 on traffic and road transportation to accommodate the presence of app-based transportation modes.

The presence of Uber, Grab and GoJek has long shown up a "policy divide" between President Joko Widodo, who wants to accommodate the app-based taxis and Transportation Minister Ignasius Jonan who insists on banning them.

A survey conducted by the Association of Indonesian Internet Providers (APJII) in cooperation with the University of Indonesia (UI) between November 2014 and February 2015 provides a fresh look at the state of the digital divide in the country.

It found that close to 89 million – 35 percent of Indonesia's 250 million population – already had access to the internet in 2014, up from the 28.6 percent in 2013 and 24.2 in 2012. And the number is expected to continue to rise along with the burgeoning middle class and the fact that more business, politics, governance, education and entertainment have been moving online since Indonesia started building the infrastructure in the 1980s.

Although the number of internet users is increasing, the access divide remains wide open due mainly to financing and infrastructure constraints, as the survey found. Indonesia remains way behind ASEAN neighbors, such as Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand, in terms of internet penetration despite its status as one of the world's largest users of Facebook and Twitter.

The study revealed that most internet users live in western Indonesia: Java, Bali and Sumatra, where they account for 52 million people. Sulawesi comes a distant second with 7.3 million users and the eastern regions of Maluku, Nusa Tenggara and Papua with 5.9 million. Kalimantan slumps at the bottom of the list with 4.2 million.

The demographic gap still masks serious discrepancies in infrastructure development: The internet is enjoyed by people in major cities such as Bandung, West Java; Denpasar, Bali; Jakarta; Medan, North Sumatra; Surabaya, East Java; and Yogyakarta. Although the country's vast rural areas are also vital when it comes to development, they are yet to obtain equal access.

This inequality widens the development gap among provinces in Indonesia. In the education sector, for instance, outlying regions of Papua, where internet connections come and go, are farther trailing behind Java where the internet has become a basic facility.

The basic problem with the Indonesian internet network is access and speed. It was only in November 2015 that the entire country was properly "reframed" to enable a nationwide mobile 4G/LTE network to operate.

No doubt, access and speed have significantly improved over time but even with the advent of higher speed broadband networks and the adoption of 3G and 4G mobile networks nationwide, the truth remains that access is not uniform throughout the archipelago and the quality is still patchy at best.

According to Akamai, a global content delivery network services provider, the average speed of internet connection in Indonesia was 2.2 Mbps last year, way slower than that of neighboring Singapore (12.9 Mbps), Malaysia (4.3 Mbps), the Philippines (2.8 Mbps) and Vietnam (3.2 Mbps).

"Nationally, western regions, which have major cities, are better connected than those in the east. There is an access divide between cities and small towns," says Heru Sutadi, founder of the Indonesian Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Institute.

Even though high-speed networks, such as 4G, are available in some rural areas, they are operated by multiple providers who set different rates – all still too expensive for the masses and at the end of the day only the richer and more educated can afford them.

Smartphones, the service backbone of many businesses like GoJek, Grab and Uber as well as home industries, are the most common mode used to access the internet. According to tech behemoth Google, 43 percent of Indonesians use such devices for daily communication and internet access and the UI-APJII survey found that 85 percent of users access the internet via their cell phones.

Hugely popular thanks to their more affordable prices, smartphones are no longer a luxury. For lower-end consumers, local and global-brand phones are available for less than Rp 1 million (US$76) and the used cell phone business keeps on booming.

But only a small proportion of smartphone owners in the country are proficient enough to use their sophisticated device for really productive purposes like browsing for information and business. As the UI-APJII survey revealed, 87.4 percent of users take to the internet mostly for social media.

With a budding digital economy beginning to take on a healthy shape in the country, various surveys show that the internet is also increasingly used for more commercially productive purposes.

"What's interesting is that many rural users have already used the internet over the last two years to compare prices of rice or fish [with those in other places] so that they are not ripped off by market prices," Heru says.

For its part, the Communications and Information Technology Ministry has laid down a vision of narrowing the digital divide in its 2015-2019 strategic masterplan, which aims to maximize the use of the internet to boost the economy and improve governance.

The plan outlines the need to improve public access to ICT and increase the range and size of telecommunications infrastructure within the next five years.

High on the government agenda is implementation of ambitious projects, such as the Palapa Ring project, and the requirement for telecommunications providers to share their infrastructure. The plan puts an emphasis on the digital economy and e-commerce becoming leading actors in economic growth.

Aside from the basic issues related to equality of access and speed, the state is yet to make the best use of ICT for poverty eradication and the empowerment of people in less developed regions through education.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/country-awakens-gaping-digital-divide.html

Environment & natural disasters

Hundreds reject Benoa reclamation project

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2016

Hundreds of residents of Pakraman village, Denpasar staged a rally on Thursday to oppose a planned reclamation project in Benoa Bay, Bali which they believe would destroy the environment and their culture.

"The residents from 105 banjar [sub-villages] agreed to reject the reclamation in Benoa Bay," the village's secretary Anak Agung Putu Wibawa was quoted by tribunnews.com as saying.

Wibawa said the residents rejected the project in an effort to preserve Bali's nature and culture as a heritage that should be inherited by their future children. He said the opposition was also being undertaken since Benoa bay was considered a sacred area by Balinese Hindus.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/22/islands-focus-hundreds-reject-benoa-reclamation-project.html

Almost all reclamation in Indonesia illegal, claims environmental group

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

Elly Burhaini Faizal – The Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) has revealed that almost all reclamation projects in Indonesia, including projects in Jakarta, Bali and Makassar, have violated bylaws on zoning of coastal areas and small islands.

The environmental group says there are currently 14 reclamation projects in the country: Four projects have been completed, four are underway and the remaining six projects are still in the pipeline.

"The Tangerang reclamation plan is the gravest, as it is aiming to reclaim 7,500 hectares of land," Walhi campaign manager Edo Rakhman said in a discussion in Central Jakarta on Wednesday. "However, public attention has tended to focus on reclamation projects in Jakarta, Bali and Makassar, because those cities are categorized as national strategic zones."

According to Walhi, the ongoing Jakarta and Makassar projects will cover 5,100 ha and 4,000 ha, respectively. Two other projects are taking place in Palu, Central Sulawesi, of 24.5 ha, and in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, of 5,130 ha.

Meanwhile, the Bali project, which is still at the planning stage, will cover 700 ha. Reclamation is also planned in Kendari (17.5 ha), Lombok (1,250 ha), Bitung (2,000 ha) and South Aceh (6,305 ha).

"Almost all of the reclamation projects are problematic as they are going on without the presence of or contradict bylaws on zoning of coastal areas and small islands," Edo said.

He added that the Makassar reclamation project involved at least 14 companies, including Ciputra Group. Through its subsidiary, PT Ciputra Surya, the group is working together with PT Yasmin Bumi Asri to form a joint venture, Ciputra Yasmin, to develop CitraLand City Losari Makassar.

Meanwhile, the Bali reclamation project began on December 2012 when the island's governor granted private investor PT Tirta Wahana Bali Internasional (TWBI) permission to develop and reclaim Benoa Bay as part of an integrated tourist development area.

On the other hand, the Jakarta reclamation project was initially a part of the National Capital Integrated Coastal Development (NCICD) plan, more popularly known as the Great Garuda, which aims to build a seawall to keep water out of the city and to help slow subsidence.

The land reclamation was later taken over by the Jakarta city administration, involving the construction of 17 artificial islets developed by private companies off the north coast of the capital.

Kenzo, another researcher at Walhi, said the Jakarta reclamation project would damage the coast and harm the ecosystems of nearby islands. (vps/ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/almost-all-reclamation-in-indonesia-illegal-claims-environmental-group.html

New Indonesia mill raises doubts about APP's forests pledge

Associated Press - April 20, 2016

Stephen Wright – A landmark commitment by one of the world's largest producers of tissue and paper to stop cutting down Indonesia's prized tropical forests is under renewed scrutiny as the company prepares to open a giant pulp mill in South Sumatra.

To fanfare more than three years ago, Asia Pulp and Paper promised to use only plantation woods after an investigation by one of its strongest critics, Greenpeace, showed its products were partly made from the pulp of endangered trees.

Greenpeace welcomed the announcement as a breakthrough and the company, long reviled by activists as a villain, rebranded itself as a defender of the environment, helping it to win back customers that had severed ties. At the same time, it was pressing ahead behind the scenes with plans to build a third pulp mill in Indonesia.

When it went public with its plans for the OKI mill in 2013, APP announced it would produce 2 million tons a year and then earlier this year acknowledged the mill's capacity could in the future increase to 2.8 million tons.

New research released Wednesday by a dozen international and Indonesian environmental groups estimates that APP will face a significant shortfall in its supply of plantation-grown wood after the new mill begins operating, even at a 2.0 million ton capacity. The company could then face a choice between using higher-cost imported wood or looking the other way as its suppliers encroach upon virgin forests.

"APP, while it has been presenting itself as a champion of zero deforestation, is building one of the world's biggest pulp mills," said Christopher Barr of Woods & Wayside International, one of the organizations involved with the report.

"There will be a great deal of pressure to ensure it receives adequate supplies of wood to keep it operating at full capacity," he said. "Our analysis shows the group's existing planted area in South Sumatra is unlikely to produce the volumes of wood the mill is expected to consume at projected capacity levels."

How the mill, which could operate for more than half a century, is fed will be a factor in the survival of Indonesia's tropical forests and the endangered wildlife they shelter. More generally, the draining and destruction of peatlands for forestry or agriculture will over decades release vast amounts of carbon that could jeopardize Indonesia's ability to meet its emission reduction targets under an international agreement due to be signed within days.

The report estimates that APP's plantations in South Sumatra have never produced half of the wood needed to feed a 2.0 million ton a year pulp operation. That shortfall is compounded by devastating forest and peatland fires across Indonesia last year that destroyed more than a quarter of APP's planted trees in South Sumatra, according to an on-the-ground survey by Hutan Kita Institute and other civil society groups. The company said it would it respond to concerns about the mill.

APP is the crown jewel of the Sinar Mas conglomerate, one of Southeast Asia's largest companies. For a time it was a pariah in financial markets after defaulting in 2001 on US$13.9 billion of debt, which still ranks as the biggest default by a company from a developing nation. It has secured Chinese funding for the OKI mill.

The draining of peatlands, which make up the bulk of the concession land in South Sumatra that supplies APP, is a fraught issue for Indonesia's neighbors. Record fires on peatlands and forests last year caused $16 billion of losses for Indonesia, according to the World Bank, and sent a smoky, health-damaging haze across the country and into Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand.

The mill and its plantations, meanwhile, affect the livelihoods of thousands of people who have lived for decades on land used by APP. The company is embroiled in hundreds of land use conflicts across Indonesia and has yet to reach an agreement with any community after vowing to settle such disputes in 2013

Once the new mill begins operating, "I think it will be even more difficult for communities to get their land back" said Aidil Fitri, of Hutan Kita Institute, which is advocating for two communities in conflict with APP in South Sumatra.

"Now they have OKI mill and we believe they need more lands for their plantations," he said. "On the other side, the communities who have conflicts with APP need their lands back for their livelihood, to do agriculture, not for acacia plantations."

Greenpeace forests campaigner Andy Tait said APP has maintained it will only supply the mill with plantation or imported wood. But he acknowledged that APP's assessment that its plantation wood supply is adequate predates last year's "horrendous" fires, which heavily affected the company.

"We don't see any sign of APP pulling back from its commitments on no deforestation at this stage and it would obviously be commercial suicide for them to do so," he said. "But this mill construction raises a number of critical questions that need to be addressed."

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/seasia/2016/04/20/new-indonesia-mill-raises-doubts-about-apps-forests-pledge.htm

Public warned as fires destroy 700 ha of forest, plantations in Riau

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Rizal Harahap and Severianus Endi – The general public were warned about the possibility of massive forest and land fires on Monday, after fires ravaged a total 700 ha in Meranti Islands regency, Riau province, over the past three months.

Acting head of the Meranti Islands Disaster Mitigation Agency (BPBD) M. Edy Afrizal, said the worst fires occurred in March, during which over 500 ha were burned.

"All nine districts across Meranti Islands regency experienced forest and land fires. What was different from one district to another was simply the area burned," Edy said, Monday.

He said that the fires had burned through rubber and sago plantations belonging to residents as well as an industrial forest that belonged to PT Sumatera Riang Lestari (PT SRL), a concession company in Parit Jawa village, Tanjung Kedabu subdistrict, Rangsang Island. Of the 100 ha of land burned in Tanjung Kedabu, 30 ha had belonged to PT SRL, Edy said.

"We are still waiting for further instruction regarding the burned land in the concession area," said Edy, adding that there had been a regulation stipulating that burned concession areas would be taken over by the government preceding the revocation of licenses.

He also said that, as of Sunday, all the fires had been extinguished due to the rains that had fallen across almost the whole of the Meranti Islands.

However, he called on the community to remain on alert and immediately report any sign of fire to the BPBD. That way fire could be extinguished as soon as possible. "We also call on companies to be cooperative. Please report concession area fires to the BPBD immediately," Edy said.

He also reminded them not to clear land using burning methods. Meranti is dominated by peatlands which, he said, caught fire with relative ease. "Once a fire has begun within a peatland area, it can be very difficult to extinguish," he said, reminding people of the severe forest and land fires in the region in 2014.

Meanwhile the executive director of the Indonesian Forum for the Environment's (Walhi) West Kalimantan chapter criticized mass media for failing to raise awareness of issues regarding forest and land fires during the recent period of respite.

He said that mass media tended to raise the issue of forest and land fires only when the resulting haze was already thick and neighboring countries had begun to complain.

Spokesperson for the Environment and Forestry Ministry, Novrizal, expressed similar criticism, saying that mass media could play a role beyond times of severe fire.

He said that if the media were to play a constructive role, both in the context of prevention and as a responsive act, it would significantly help to control forest and land fires in Indonesia.

According to the ministry's website sipongi.menlhk.go.id, the total area burned in West Kalimantan in 2015 was 995 ha, a significant decrease compared to the 2014 fire season which saw 3,556 ha burned due to forest and land fires. The total area of the province is 147,307 square kilometers.

The site also indicates that forest and land fires in Riau burned 2,643 ha in the same year, followed by Jambi with 2,217 ha.

According to World Bank research, the forest and land fires caused Rp 221 trillion in state losses in 2015. The figure equals 1.9 percent of the country's gross domestic product, twice the amount of the reconstruction fund required as a consequence of the 2004 Aceh tsunami.

Separately, Greenpeace Indonesia campaigner Zamzami said that, in collaboration with Global Forest Watch, his organization had developed an interactive map called Peta Kepo Hutan (forest curiosity map) last year, which anyone, including mass media, could access through the Greenpeace website.

"This interactive map was developed to push mass media and youth involvement, to make them more sensitive to environmental issues including the emergence of hot spots that, through the map, can be detected within 24 hours," he said.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/public-warned-fires-destroy-700-ha-forest-plantations-riau.html

Marriage & polygamy

Silent crime: Child marriage

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2016

The kidnapping of girls in Nigeria, who have been reportedly married off to their Boko Haram captors, remains a shocking crime; after two years, the girls are still missing. Yet democratic Indonesia, whose president is on a tour wooing Europe, allows the marriage of 16-year-old girls – even while the child protection law states children are those below the age of 18.

Last year, the 1974 law on marriage was upheld by the Constitutional Court – which turned down a request to raise the minimum legal marrying age for girls to 18. Among the plaintiffs' arguments were that child marriage contributes to Indonesia's high maternal mortality rate, the highest in Southeast Asia at 395 deaths for every 100,000 live deliveries, underweight newborns and preteens who are unequipped physically and mentally as wives and mothers.

But there is no process to revise the law as we commemorate Kartini Day on April 21 to honor the heroine credited with improving women's standing.

A study released on Thursday by NGO Rumah Kitab reported findings from Banten, West Java, South Sulawesi, West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) and East Java – not only confirm earlier studies, including that poverty and parents' fear of their girl becoming an "old maid" drive communities and families to marry off girls barely out of high school.

The team under noted scholar Lies Marcoes also reported that all studied areas where child marriage was rampant were areas where communities and families had been deprived of their land and other resources. The causes are not only "voluntary" sale of land for daily needs and education, pilgrimages or lavish ceremonies, but also imposed changes on land function for infrastructure, factories and plantations. Such areas saw men and women leaving for cities or going abroad as migrant workers, leaving children in the care of elders and other family members.

Household responsibilities were shifted to girls in the family, not the fathers who stayed at home, and many resorted to marriage, as they could no longer bear the responsibility of taking care of the household, the report said.

In Lombok, NTB, elders were quoted as saying that child marriages were now more frequent than in the days of their youth. Worse, religion has increasingly been abused to justify child marriage – not only by clerics who spread fears on the sin of extramarital sex – but also by the Constitutional Court.

Adults prioritizing children's wellbeing are the exception. Nyai Dewi Khalifah, who leads a pesantren (Islamic boarding school) in Sumenep, East Java, is one educator who does not drive girls out of school when they become pregnant or get married.

Ending child marriage requires ending abuse of religious teachings, but, more importantly, the state must no longer facilitate statutory rape, as stated in the Criminal Code.

A humane Indonesia can have no place for cases such as that of the cleric Syech Puji, who married nine year-olds under the nose of the police and Semarang authorities. Neither can we have the state endorsing child marriage, and children being allowed to have children.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/22/silent-crime-child-marriage.html

Push to eliminate child marriage

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2016

The Religious Affairs Ministry urged the House of Representatives on Thursday to revise the 1974 Marriage Law to prevent child marriage.

The ministry's Islam development director general, Muhammad Machasin, said that the revision should focus on the minimum age of marriage stipulated in the law, which is currently 19 years for males and 16 years for females.

"The problem with the age requirement is that lawmakers have stipulated the minimum age by looking only at physical aspects, not mental. Most of the time, that is not enough to determine someone's maturity," Machasin said after a book launch about Child Marriage by NGO Rumah Kita Bersama (Our House).

The NGO's director, Lies Marcoes-Natsir, voiced the same concerns. "You cannot call someone at the age of 16 an adult. Our [marriage] law should refer to a concept of maturity based on mental development, not merely physical," Lies said.

The 2002 Child Protection Law states that a child is a person under 18 years of age, including those who are still in the womb. The UN's 2003 agenda for sustainable development also states that child, early and forced marriage should all be eliminated.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/22/national-scene-push-eliminate-child-marriage.html

Terrorism & religious extremism

House concerned about human rights in terrorism bill

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2016

Marguerite Afra Sapiie – The House of Representatives' special committee on the revision of the 2003 Terrorism Law has called for a supervisory mechanism to oversee the extended detention period for terrorism suspects to prevent potential human rights violations.

In a discussion of the bill, the government proposed that police could detain alleged terrorists for up to 510 days after the arrest and before trial, nearly three times as long as the 180 days stipulated in the current law.

Such a long period required strict monitoring, said committee member Asrul Sani, a member of House Commission III overseeing legal affairs. "If we want a longer detention period, this should be balanced with a mechanism to supervise the [police]," Asrul told thejakartapost.com recently.

The terrorism act applied in the UK allowed police to detain a person suspected of being a terrorist for up to 48 hours without charges, he said. The police could extend the period to a maximum of 28 days; however, that needed to be reviewed by an independent team beforehand.

Indonesia should have a similar mechanism of independent reviewers to supervise the police's use of authority and ensure transparency and accountability, Asrul said.

Separately, committee chairman Muhammad Syafii said the committee would conduct a careful and comprehensive study regarding the detention period, especially from a human rights perspective. "If the broader authority contributes to more human rights abuse, we will not approve the request," Syafii said as quoted by tribunnews.com on Thursday.

The government has demanded stronger and wider law enforcement powers for counterterrorism measures, and saw its position strengthened by a terrorists attack in the heart of the capital city in January that killed eight people, including four suspected terrorists. However, the recent death of an alleged terrorist named Siyono has raised questions about the authority given to the National Police.

Siyono died in March in the custody of the National Police's antiterrorism squad Densus 88. Suspicions of him being tortured by Densus personnel rose after his family found his body covered in bruises and after an independent autopsy found he had died from fractured ribs.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/22/house-concerned-about-human-rights-in-terrorism-bill.html

Amnesty International push for accountability

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2016

Marguerite Afra Sapiie – National Police chief Gen. Badrodin Haiti's statement that a Densus 88 officer kicked terror suspect Siyono in the chest serves as a turning point in Indonesia's persistent denial that its security apparatus uses torture, Amnesty International has said.

Josef Benedict, Amnesty International's Director of Campaigns for Southeast Asia, said Badrodin's confirmation brought a light of hope in attempts to reveal the truth behind the impunity culture within Indonesia's security forces.

The government should order the formation of a robust and independent inquiry to investigate how widespread the use of torture has been all along, Benedict said in a statement received by thejakartapost.com on Thursday. "There is an urgent need for long overdue accountability and new laws criminalizing the use of torture," Benedict said.

Earlier on Wednesday, Badrodin revealed publicly that the Densus 88 officer who guarded Siyono admitted to kneeing the terror suspect in chest during a fight in the car. The action broke Siyono's ribs, and led to his death.

The admission was made following an independent autopsy on Siyono's body that found his death was due to a broken breastbone that pierced his heart. Previously, the police claimed that Siyono died from a brain haemorrhage.

Siyono, thought by the intelligence community to be one of the leaders of neo-Jamaah Islamiyah (JI), died while in police custody. An investigation from the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) revealed that Siyono's dead body was covered in blood and wounds, raising allegations of the use of torture during the interrogation.

Amnesty International said there were a number of cases where the police and Densus 88 should be investigated for allegedly violating human rights during their operations.

Previously, the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) revealed that at least 121 individuals suspected of being terrorists had died due to abuse and torture inflicted on them by police officers between 2007-2016 in counterterrorism operations.

"No credible investigation has ever been conducted, while the police have sought to shield themselves from accountability by making illusory pledges to investigate themselves," the statement read.

Since Tuesday, the police's Internal Affairs Division (Propam) has been conducting an ethics hearing to probe the behavior of two Densus 88 members who guarded and drove Siyono from his house following his arrest on March 8 to the police's interrogation center.

On the heels of the Densus 88 member's explanation, the prosecutors has reportedly demanded the officer to be expelled, Badrodin said. However, Badrodin said sanctions would depend on testimonies and facts delivered to the hearing. (bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/22/amnesty-international-push-for-accountability.html

Anti-terrorism law revision to uphold human rights: House

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Erika Anindita Dewi – The Terrorism Law revision must include human rights protection to prevent incidents such as the recent death of terrorism suspect Siyono from reoccurring, House of Representatives deputy speaker Fadli Zon has said.

He made the remarks after inaugurating the leaders of the special committee (pansus) that will deliberate the law revision. He said that the presumption of innocence must be upheld until a trial process proved otherwise.

"We obviously must eradicate terrorism. But prevention is also important. We don't want to be a country where safety becomes a prominent issue, as it was during the New Order," Fadli said at the House complex in South Jakarta, on Monday.

The government plans to amend the 2003 Law on the eradication of terrorism and the 2013 Law on the prevention and eradication of terrorism financing.

The revision committee is made up of 30 members, consisting of lawmakers from House Commission I overseeing intelligence, defense and foreign affairs and Commission III overseeing legal affairs.

Gerindra Party faction politician Muhammad Syafi'i is leading the committee, along with Hanafi Rais of the National Mandate Party (PAN), Syaiful Bahri Ansori of the National Awakening Party (PKB) and Supiadin Aries from NasDem as deputy chairmen.

Supiadin Aries said the revision would not only aim to strengthen counter-terrorism measures, but would also prioritize the rights of all terrorist suspects. The committee wants the revision to include protection for terrorism victims, preventive measures and an early detection mechanism.

"We have to respect [people's rights], there should not be any article in the law that could lead officers to violate human rights," Supiadin said as quoted by kompas.com on Monday. In the near future, he continued, the committee would hold a working meeting with the government to hear what officials wanted to include in the revision of the Law.

The House leaders did not give a specific time limit for the committee to complete their deliberation of the draft revision of Law No. 15/2003 on counterterrorism, Fadli added. (afr/ags)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/anti-terrorism-law-revision-to-uphold-human-rights-house.html

Freedom of religion & worship

Yogyakarta artists fight against intolerance

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

Bambang Muryanto – Artists in Yogyakarta have used a creative way to protest the intolerance that continues to grow in a city that claims to be a dignified city of culture.

At a recent art event, artists created murals and posters and staged musical performances to symbolize their fight against intolerant groups. These intolerant groups have tried to limit artistic freedom of expression of late.

In their resistance, street artists painted several strategic places black. On the Kewek railway bridge, they wrote out a sentence that read "penyeragaman membunuh keberagaman" (The process of uniformity kills diversity). They also created a large question mark painting to call into question the city administration's tagline: Yogyakarta: city of tolerance.

"It's a sign of mourning and it's our response to a case affecting Survive Garage," Djuwadi, an artist and activist from the Peaceful Yogya Solidarity Forum (FSYD), told thejakartapost.com on Monday.

Meanwhile, street artist group Antitank created a poster reading: "Emergency of Intolerance in Yogyakarta". Antitank is widely known for its posters that express sharp social criticism.

Yogyakarta artists say violent acts perpetrated by intolerant groups, with the support of the police, have begun to threaten freedom of expression. The disbandment of the art event Lady Fast 2016 held at Survive Garage on April 2 was the latest example of intolerance affecting artists in the city. A transgender literary event held at the University of Gadjah Mada (UGM) also received threats from intolerant groups toward the end of December 2015.

As reported earlier, after the disbandment of Lady Fast 2016, local residents prohibited Survive Garage members from staying in a house they had leased at Tegal Kenongo, Tirtonirmolo, Bantul, Yogyakarta.

Several musicians have also moved to fight against intolerance by creating a group called Saksinada. They want to fight for social change by providing greater room for freedom of expression, tolerance and pluralism.

"We will participate in the fight against social problems. There are many conflicts in Yogyakarta," said Bagus Dwi Danto, a member of musical group Sisir Tanah, during the launch of Saksinada at the Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) in Yogyakarta on Sunday.

Saksinada comprises several local musical groups and musicians. They include Sisir Tanah, Agoni, Deugalih, Dendang Kampungan (Yogyakarta), Iksan Skuter (Malang), Antitank (Yogyakarta) and Fajar Merah and Fitri Merah, two children of Wiji Thukul, a poet who was forcibly "disappeared" prior to the reforms in March 1998.

Galih, from Deugalih, said all artists must unite to fight against intolerant groups. "If we act alone, we will be easily defeated and we will have to hide from them," she said.

Musician Iksan Skuter, who composed a song for Salim Kancil, a farmer murdered in Lumajang, East Java, for fighting against illegal sand mining, said art should not be limited to entertainment. "Art can also be used to move people to rebel [against injustice]," Iksan said. (ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/yogyakarta-artists-fight-against-intolerance.html

Civil servant fired for joining Gafatar

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

The East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) administration has announced that a civil servant from Lembata regency has been dismissed for joining the Fajar Nusantara (Gafatar) movement. Arifuddin, who works at the Lembata development planning board, has been dismissed since March 2016.

NTT Governor Frans Lebu Raya asked regents and mayors to dismiss civil servants who joined Gafatar as it is clearly prohibited by the government. "Earlier, there was a civil servant in NTT who joined Gafatar. I asked the regent to dismiss the civil servant," said Frans on Saturday.

Lembata Regent Yance Sunur confirmed the dismissal of the civil servant who he said had left work for more than a year.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/islands-focus-civil-servant-fired-joining-gafatar.html

Poverty & social inequity

Rich spend less, poor spend more amid difficult economy

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Tassia Sipahutar – Recent data suggesting an improvement to equality in the country has not impressed economists who believe that it merely reflects restrained consumption among the wealthy and rising living costs for the poor, rather than welfare improvement. The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) reported the narrowing spending gap on Monday based on the latest Gini ratio data, which fell to 0.40 in September 2015 from a position of 0.41 in March 2015. It was the first decline on a national level since September 2011.

A Gini ratio of 0 represents perfect equality, while an index of 1 implies perfect inequality. The ratio measures the extent to which the distribution of income – or in some cases, consumption expenditure – among individuals or households within an economy deviates from a perfectly equal distribution.

Twenty percent of the population with the highest spending posted a drop in expenditure between April and September. Their share of total spending was down to 47.84 percent from 48.25 percent, as shown by BPS data.

"They're the ones with the option to cut back on spending, which subsequently affected our domestic consumption in the second and third quarters," said Maybank Indonesia chief economist Juniman.

Domestic consumption, which accounts for more than half of the country's economy, dropped to a level of 4.9 percent year-on-year (yoy) in the second and third quarters, respectively, from 5.01 percent yoy in the first, putting pressure on overall growth.

Indonesia's gross domestic product (GDP) grew 4.67 percent in the second quarter, inching up 4.73 percent in the third quarter, maintaining its six year low. Considerable layoffs were also reported up to the month of September last year, amounting to nearly 75,000 workers across different business sectors, according to various sources compiled by Bahana Securities.

As the economy decelerated during the period, the affluent members of the population elected to save on their secondary and tertiary spending, Juniman added.

Samuel Asset Management chief economist Lana Soelistianingsih also attributed the upper class spending cut to exchange rate volatility, saying that the wealthy were more sensitive to any weakening of the rupiah.

The rupiah sank by an average 12.5 percent to Rp 14,693 per US dollar in September from Rp 13,065 in March, according to data from Bloomberg.

On the other hand, those with the lowest spending capabilities, equivalent to 40 percent of the population, saw their expenses soar, with its share of overall spending climbing to 17.45 percent from 17.10 percent.

However, this rise in spending did not result from the poor having obtained higher income, but was due to the soaring consumer prices linked to basic needs, as reflected by inflation statistics. Inflation rose significantly to 6.8 percent on an annual basis in September, with foodstuff increasing 8.3 percent yoy.

"They could not simply afford to spend, they were having to purchase essential goods and this oft meant withdrawing their savings," said Bank Central Asia (BCA) chief economist David Sumual.

He said that Bank Indonesia's reports on broad money corroborated the assumption as savings growth was squeezed between April and September last year. The economists said that it would not be easy to lower the Gini ratio to 0.39, as targeted in this year's state budget.

Juniman proposed that the government should further develop Jakarta and other regions that recorded the widest inequality, namely Yogyakarta, in Central Java, as well as West Java and West Papua.

The World Bank, on the other hand, wrote in its Indonesia's Rising Divide report that infrastructure improvement and significant reforms in fiscal policy were among the strategies that Indonesia could implement to reduce the gap.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/rich-spend-less-poor-spend-more-amid-difficult-economy.html

Papua named worst region for income equality, Babel the best

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

Ayomi Amindoni – The vast, mineral-rich province of Papua has the worst income equality in the country, with a Gini ratio of 0.43 percent, exceeding the national ratio of 0.4, according to the Central Statistics Agency's (BPS) latest report.

Yogyakarta, West Java and Jakarta also recorded above-average gaps of inequality. At the opposite end of the scale, Bangka Belitung (Babel) province recorded the lowest ratio at 0.27, followed by Maluku with 0.29 and Central Kalimantan with 0.3.

BPS social statistics deputy head M. Sairi Hasbullah explained that the presence of mining companies in Papua, such as copper giant PT Freeport Indonesia, had create a huge gap in the region.

"In Papua, there are modern businesses such as those run by Freeport and others, while people are still living very traditionally. So it is very likely that there is a wide gap," Sairi said on Monday in Jakarta.

Meanwhile, the wide inequality gap in Yogyakarta was because low-income people in the region recorded low consumption compared to other regions.

"Actually, the consumption of the high-income group in Yogyakarta is not as high as in Jakarta. But the very low consumption of the low-income group there led to the gap being wider," he said.

The Gini ratio is an indicator measuring income distribution inequality. A coefficient of zero expresses perfect equality, while one (100 percent) implies maximal inequality. Indonesia's Gini ratio slightly declined by 0.01 to 0.40 in September 2015.

Sairi explained that the average Gini coefficient in urban areas had improved slightly from 0.43 to 0.42 because of sluggish export-import business activity, while in rural areas it was relatively stable at 0.33.

"The economic performance was down until September 2015 due to the sluggish global conditions. Exports fell, which decreased public income. Meanwhile, the Gini ratio in rural areas is relatively stagnant at a low level due to the wage increase," he said.

According to BPS data, the average spending per capita in urban areas increased to almost Rp 3,000,000 in September 2015, compared to Rp 2,600,000 in March 2015. In rural areas, average per capita spending increased from Rp 1,400,000 to 1,500,000 in the same period. (ags)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/papua-named-worst-region-for-income-equality-babel-the-best.html

Indonesia's Gini ratio advances to 0.4

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

Ayomi Amindoni – Indonesia's Gini coefficient ratio improved by 0.01 to 0.4 in September 2015. The Gini ratio is an indicator measuring income-distribution inequality. A coefficient of zero expresses perfect equality, while one (100 percent) implies maximal inequality.

The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) head Suryamin said the country's Gini ratio stood at 0.38 on March 2010, slipped to 0.39 in September 2010, and further deteriorated to 0.41 in March 2011. It stagnated at that level until March 2015.

"This means there's an improvement in income-distribution equality," Suryamin said at a press conference held in Jakarta on Monday.

Several factors, he said, contributed to the improvement including wage increases in the agricultural and construction sectors. Average agricultural wages increased from Rp 46,180 (US$3.50) per day in March 2015 to Rp 46,739 in September 2015.

"Likewise, construction workers wages grew 1.05 percent from Rp 79,657 in March 2015 to Rp 80,494 per day in September 2015," Suryamin went on.

An increase in the number of informal workers in the agricultural and construction sectors helped improve the Gini ratio, he said. Based on the national labor force survey (SUSENAS), the number of informal workers in the two sectors rose from 11.9 million in Feb. 2015 to 12.5 million in Aug. 2015.

In addition, low-income expenditure increased more quickly than among people on high incomes, according to the survey.

"The increase in expenditure cannot be separated from the government's efforts to boost infrastructure, which has effectively absorbed lower-income workers into the highways and ports projects," Suryamin explained.

He added that the percentage of the urban population stood at 52.55 percent in March 2015 and increased to 53.19 percent in Sept. 2015.

The government aims to improve the Gini ratio, from 0.41 to 0.39 in 2016, which is too ambitious according to International NGO Forum on Indonesian Development (INFID) program manager Siti Khoirun Ni'mah.

She pointed out that Brazil took 15 years to lower its Gini ratio from 0.59 to 0.54. According to her, the main problem with inequality in Indonesia is the high number of people with a limited education. (ags)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/indonesias-gini-ratio-advances-to-0-4.html

Governance & administration

Doubts on efficacy of tax amnesty

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Khoirul Amin – The tax amnesty bill, which was formulated by the government and business associations, is now being deliberated at the House of Representatives.

However, most local business associations remain doubtful about the effectiveness of the measure, if implemented, in bringing back billions of dollars to the country as well as improving overall taxpayer compliance and widening the tax base, as claimed by the government.

"We all basically agree with the plan, but some are questioning whether the measure will really lure a huge fund repatriation," Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) vice chairman Suryadi Sasmita said on Tuesday during a hearing at House Commission XI overseeing finance.

The Indonesian Employers Association (Apindo) estimated that the scheme would attract around Rp 2 quadrillion (US$152.6 billion), far less than the government's estimate of Rp 4.1 quadrillion.

Although there are no official statistics regarding the wealth held overseas by Indonesians or the amount of funds that might be retrieved by offering the pardon, Finance Minister Bambang Brodjonegoro has estimated that overseas wealth exceeds the country's gross domestic product – currently Rp 13 quadrillion (US$988 billion) – and says it has been accumulating since the 1970s.

Under the scheme, the government expects the amnesty to entice rich individuals to bring home their wealth, on which they have avoided paying taxes by stashing it abroad for years.

They will be pardoned for their past tax violations, on certain conditions, such as that they pay off their tax arrears and redemption money. The amount to be redeemed will vary, depending on the timing of their application for pardon.

Meanwhile, another Kadin representative, Bambang Sungkono, questioned the urgency of the plan, saying there would be an automatic exchange of information (AEOI) in 2018, when participating countries are obliged to exchange non-resident financial account information with tax authorities in the account holders' countries of residence.

"Even if the AEOI is implemented, I think people will still find a way to avoid taxes by withdrawing their money from banks and investing it in gold or property instead," he said.

There are 98 jurisdictions that have committed to the AEOI at present, with Indonesia, along with another 42, slated to undertake the first exchange in 2018. Another 55 countries, meanwhile, are set to implement the commitment by 2017.

On the other hand, the Association of Young Indonesian Businessmen's (Hipmi) tax center chairman, Ajib Hamdani, said his association would fully support the implementation of the tax amnesty bill, if turned into law, as it would likely cover the state budget shortfall of around Rp 290 trillion this year.

"However, the government should be able to make use of data obtained from the tax amnesty, if it materializes, to make it sustainable," he said.

Ajib recalled that the government's 2008 sunset policy, which targeted companies, was successful in closing a budget shortfall but failed to sustain in subsequent years because of the government's inability to optimally use the database.

House Speaker Ade Komarudin previously gave his assurances that talks on the tax amnesty bill would be completed by the end of the current sitting period on April 29, after a meeting with President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo.

The draft law has sparked controversy as many argue the plan is an unjust move that will offend compliant taxpayers. Experts, including from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), say governments that have implemented such schemes in other countries have failed to achieve their objectives.

Separately, Andreas Eddy Susetyo, an Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) lawmaker at Commission XI, said on Tuesday that his commission would question the government's main purpose for the tax amnesty.

"If they really need fresh funds right now to close the budget deficit, why don't they crack down on the 79 percent of names that appeared in the Panama Papers that they said are accurate?" he said. Andreas said that if the government had complete data on 79 percent of the names of 2,961 Indonesians mentioned in the papers, it would be easy to meet the shortfall.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/doubts-efficacy-tax-amnesty.html

Jakarta & urban life

Jakarta kicks off operation of female-only buses

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

Callistasia Anggun Wijaya – The Jakarta city administration through its city bus management company, PT Transportasi Jakarta (Transjakarta), kicked off the operation of women-only buses when the country commemorated Kartini Day on Thursday.

The day commemorates the birthday of Kartini, a hero of women's emancipation, who was born on April 21, 1879. The release of the first pink buses was conducted by Veronica Tan, the wife of Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama.

For the initial operation, two pink buses will serve female passengers along Transjakarta Corridor I, from the Blok M bus terminal in South Jakarta to the Kota train station in North Jakarta. Eight other buses will start operation in late May.

The pink buses are reserved for female passengers who don't feel secure taking public transportation, or who are not comfortable standing shoulder to shoulder with male passengers, said Governor Ahok.

"There may be some women who are insecure to be crowded in by men for they may think that it is muhrim (men and women who are not related and cannot touch each other). These buses will make women passengers feel more comfortable to use Transjakarta," Ahok said on Thursday. Ahok said hoped that the buses would pass the bus stops every 30 minutes.

PT Transjakarta CEO Budi Kaliwono said that 40 percent of Transjakarta passengers were women. Therefore his company paid serious attention to the female passengers. He planned to deploy the female-only buses on other Transjakarta corridors.

The busses will be operated by female crews consisting of two on-board officers and a driver from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m, said Budi, adding that each bus could transport up to 118 passengers. (bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/jakarta-kicks-off-operation-of-female-only-buses.html

Coalition calls for halt to megaproject

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Dewanti A. Wardhani – A coalition of groups against land reclamation in Jakarta Bay has demanded that the government phase out all activities related to the megaproject while continuing legal steps against alleged irregularities.

The coalition includes the Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH Jakarta), Indonesian Traditional Fishermen's Association (KNTI), People's Coalition for Fisheries Justice (KIARA), Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), Indonesian Center for Environmental Law (ICEL) and Women's Solidarity.

The groups further demanded that Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama revoke all land reclamation permits so that the government could review the area and conduct a comprehensive environmental assessment on developing the city's northern coastline.

"The land reclamation has caused various environmental, cultural and economic problems. These negative effects caused by the project must be restored and the legal process against violators must continue," KNTI legal head Martin Hadiwinata said on behalf of the coalition.

During a moratorium on such projects, he went on, the government should not only conduct an environmental assessment but also ensure that the development of Jakarta's shore involved locals – not only fishermen but all those whose livelihoods depend on the sea. Martin added that all assessments and activities carried out during the moratorium must be made publicly available.

Walhi legal and executive policy manager Muhnur Satyahaprabu stated that a land reclamation moratorium should be implemented across the archipelago, as other areas also suffered similar environmental, legal and social problems. He said the central government should take legal steps to stop land reclamation completely.

Around a dozen fishermen from Muara Angke, who have been working off North Jakarta for decades, proved their existence by displaying a recent catch and their equipment during a press conference at the LBH Jakarta office following a statement from Ahok that fishermen no longer existed in Jakarta.

The fishermen asserted that their livelihoods had been significantly affected since the land reclamation projects commenced. KNTI secretary Kuat said that for the last two years, fishermen in Muara Angke had faced many difficulties.

Kuat said that before the land reclamation projects began, most fishermen traveled for less than 24 hours, using 10 liters of fuel, to catch fish and return to Muara Angke. However, for the last two years, fishermen have typically needed 40 liters of fuel and three days to fish before returning to shore.

"Before the land reclamation started, fishermen could find their catch just five to 10 meters from the shore. Now, the fishermen must sail to Karawang in West Java or to Banten," Kuat said on Tuesday.

He said there were still some fish left in Jakarta Bay, but fishermen needed to travel further to find them. The seafood in the area, he added, included kembung (mackerel) and green mussels.

KNTI fisherman Khalil said the group called on the government to be attentive and fight for fishermen's rights instead of only accommodating developers and upper-income residents. "We are residents of Jakarta and part of Indonesia, and the government should protect us just as much as it protects other residents," Khalil said.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/coalition-calls-halt-megaproject.html

Problems with Jakarta's social housing

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Corry Elyda – The Jakarta administration had evicted more than 8,145 families and 6,283 small businesses last year and the number is increasing as the first four months of this year has already seen three evictions. The city plans for more evictions by the end of 2016.

Many Jakartans fulfill their housing needs in informal or self-help based urban kampung (villages) spread among the capital's high rise buildings, with many erected on state land.

Dwellings in many of these areas have now been demolished and their owners evicted for various reasons ranging from flood mitigation, public order to tourism. Those who are "lucky" are relocated to rental low-cost apartments or rusunawa.

However, new problems arise when these families move to the rusunawa as most cannot maintain their income with the rent and bills they now have to pay.

One important aspect the city administration seems to forget is that residents who work in the informal sector like street vendors or small-scale industry build homes not only for living but also for producing.

Relocating, as what the city's design template envisioned, meant for most losing their job, decreasing income or a forced switch in profession.

Mutia, a mother of two who now lives in a Jatinegara Barat low-cost apartment in East Jakarta after being relocated from nearby Kampung Pulo, said that she could not sell chicken nuggets anymore as she could not open a stall from her apartment.

Mutia said she was now making traditional pancakes to be put in her neighbor's stall stationed on a sidewalk during nights. "I used to get Rp 700,000 [US$53.20] per month by selling nuggets. I also sold ice cubes to beverage vendors. Now, I barely get Rp 200,000," she said.

Amid complaints from evictees, the city administration has tried to compensate by holding training and providing facilities for the new tenants.

Marunda rusunawa in North Jakarta, for example, has hydroponic farm houses and intensive training on batik making to provide alternative income for the tenants. The facilities include free Transjakarta tickets, school buses, an early education center and health clinics. Tenants at the rusunawa with time also get a new social network.

Firli Aris, 15, said after living in Marunda for two years, he had made more friends in line with new evictees arriving. "Here, we have free daily futsal training organized by sport institution Meek Nusantara Foundation and a twice-weekly karate session for a monthly fee of Rp 30,000," he said.

But an evictee from the red-light district Kalijodo in West Jakarta says he has a hard time finding a new job in Marunda. "The bed is more comfortable, but I don't come to Jakarta to sleep in a comfortable bed. I come to make money," Wahyu said.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/problems-with-jakarta-s-social-housing.html

Ahok declines to meet with protesting fishermen

Jakarta Post - April 20, 2016

Callistasia Anggun Wijaya – Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama has declined to meet with fishermen protesting in front of City Hall on Tuesday and insisted that fish caught in the Jakarta Bay is not edible, as the area is heavily polluted.

"Most of the fish in Jakarta comes from Karimata, Belitung and the Natuna Sea, not from the Jakarta Bay. Do you want to fool me? You can't, I come from an island, too," said Ahok, responding to the protesters, who mocked Ahok with fish they claim was caught in the Jakarta Bay.

The Indonesian Traditional Fishermen's Association (KNTI) on Tuesday morning met with journalists at Jakarta's Legal Aid Foundation (LBH Jakarta) to voice its objections to the Jakarta Bay land reclamation project after the central government decided to temporarily halt the project while calling on the city administration to address the impacts of the project.

The fishermen said their earnings were declining since the project had started as the land reclamation work, they claimed, had caused environment damage. The project had also increased their operating costs as they had to fish farther away from the coastline.

The reclamation project has sparked a public debate following the Corruption Eradication Commission's (KPK) arrest of city councilor Muhamad Sanusi, who allegedly accepted a bribe from development company PT Agung Podomoro Land (APL). The city council was deliberating two bills that would become the legal basis for the reclamation if passed into bylaws.

The KPK also named as suspects the CEO and another official of APL, one of the concession holders in the reclamation project.

Ahok slammed KNTI for only protesting against the Agung Sedayu Group and Agung Podomoro Land, saying that the organization was inconsistent, because even fishermen's houses in Muara Angke, North Jakarta, were built on reclaimed land. He said KNTI executives only sought to make themselves popular through the protest.

Ahok said nobody had protested against his predecessor, Fauzi Bowo, when he issued a permit for PT Karya Citra Nusantara (KCN) to carry out reclamation work in Marunda. "You're all unfair. Ancol, Pluit, Muara Angke, Tanjung Priuk are all reclaimed land. People aren't protesting against that," Ahok said.

Meanwhile, LBH Jakarta lawyer Nelson Simamora expressed his disappointment over Ahok not siding with the fishermen, who had tried to express their aspirations while using their Jakarta identity cards as evidence that the fish they had caught was from the Jakarta Bay.

"As a governor, he should meet fishermen and hold a dialogue with them. His statement shows that he wants to expel the fishermen, for they are poor people," Nelson told thejakartapost.com on Tuesday.

Separately, KNTI chairman Riza Damanik claimed Ahok did not apply logic to the reclamation problem. Ahok wanted to destroy KCN land because it violated regulations but did not intend to tear down reclaimed islets, although the construction violated the law, Riza claimed.

Earlier on Tuesday, at a press conference, KNTI urged the administration to revoke all of the reclamation permits following the moratorium on the project ordered by the central government. (bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/20/ahok-declines-to-meet-with-protesting-fishermen.html

Reclamation halted amid legal wrangling, scandals

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Nurul Fitri Ramadhani and Agnes Anya – The central government and the Jakarta administration have agreed to suspend the multimillion-dollar reclamation of land in Jakarta Bay to allow officials time to disentangle the legal knots binding the megaproject.

The decision was made after Coordinating Maritime Affairs Minister Rizal Ramli. Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar and Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama met for an hour at Rizal's office on Monday afternoon.

"We demand the reclamation project be halted until we can come up with a clear legal framework," Rizal told a press conference after the meeting. They also agreed to establish a joint team to review the regulations and the project development.

The construction of 17 artificial islets off the northern coast of Jakarta has been mired in controversy since the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) arrested Jakarta city councillor Mohamad Sanusi for allegedly accepting bribes from property giant PT Agung Podomoro Land to influence the drafting of bylaws on zoning in the project area. The antigraft body later also arrested the company's president director, Ariesman Widjaja.

Despite continued opposition on environmental grounds to the reclamation, the Jakarta administration and related developers have carried on with the projects for two decades. It is estimated that developers of the 17 islands have poured at least Rp 1.5 trillion (US$114 million) into the megaproject.

Developer Agung Sedayu Group, which has even begun marketing properties on the islets it is developing, has meanwhile seen president director Sugianto "Aguan" Kusuma slapped with a travel ban for apparent involvement in corruption.

Siti recommended that all of the reclamation projects be discontinued pending coordination between the government and local administrations, including those of Tangerang in Banten and Bekasi in West Java.

The minister has yet to issue the relevant decree, however; she and her officials will first analyze the projects' effects on the environment and local people and collect related documents from developers. Acknowledging that developers might be reluctant to comply, Siti said she would not back down. "I have many ways [to force them to comply] if they refuse," she warned.

The ministry's standpoint is in line with that of the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry, which has revealed that reclamation in Jakarta Bay is illegal, as the city has yet to obtain the required permits from the ministry.

Siti added that the decree would be a binding regulation forcing regional administrations to halt the projects. "We will freeze their environmental permits. Developers will be unable to continue construction," she said.

She revealed that her ministry had already found indications of environmental damage and potential loss to people who live or make their livings in the coastal area. Those islets already under construction will be the initial targets of the ministry's investigation, while the environmental impact of those yet to begin will also be analyzed.

The chair of House of Representatives Commission IV overseeing agriculture, forestry, fisheries and the environment, Edhy Prabowo of the Gerindra Party, said that the House applauded the minister's initiative, calling on her to remain firm and impose sanctions on any party – whether developers or regional administrations – proven to have violated Law No. 32/2009 on environmental protection and management.

The commission plans to form a special inquiry to investigate the projects in greater depth. "Reclamation has become a national and cross-sectoral issue. We should seek more information on the history behind the megaproject and look for links to the current irregularities," Golkar Party lawmaker Ichsan Firdaus said, to the applause of fellow commission members.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/reclamation-halted-amid-legal-wrangling-scandals.html

Repair harm done to Jakarta Bay, fishermen demand

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Callistasia Anggun Wijay – A fisherman's group has demanded that the Jakarta administration repair the environmental damage done to Jakarta Bay by reclamation projects.

Members of the group claim that the reclamation project has significantly disrupted their activities, thereby drastically reducing their earnings.

Indonesian Traditional Fishermen's Association (KNTI) secretary-general Kuat Wibisono said on Tuesday that the bay needed to be rehabilitated to allow fishermen to continue catching fish normally.

"We want the administration to rehabilitate the environment as soon as possible. It also needs to revoke all reclamation permits," Kuat told journalists during a press conference at the offices of Jakarta Legal Aid (LBH) on Tuesday.

Dozens of KNTI members had gathered at the LBH Jakarta offices to express support for the central government's decision to temporarily halt reclamation work in Jakarta Bay. The decision was made at a meeting on Monday attended by Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama, Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya and Coordinating Maritime Affairs Minister Rizal Ramli.

According to Kuat, security guards employed by firms developing reclaimed islets have taken to patrolling a circumference 200 to 300 meters around the projects, blocking any fishermen who approach. "They force us to stay away from the islets," said Kuat, adding that guards often threatened fishermen with violence.

The fishermen brought fish and fishing equipment with them to the LBH Jakarta offices on Tuesday. The fish, they said, were caught in Jakarta Bay, refuting Ahok's claims that the body of water is too polluted to support fishermen's livelihoods.

"What would [Ahok] say if we showed him that Jakarta Bay is still full of fish?" asked Saifuddin, though acknowledging that his catch had been reduced as a result of the reclamation. (bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/repair-harm-done-to-jakarta-bay-fishermen-demand.html

Groups call for moratorium on evictions

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

An alliance of civil society groups calling themselves People's Decree have called on the Jakarta administration to halt all planned evictions, stating that rights violations have been found to occur in previous evictions.

The activists said recently they had requested a public hearing with the governor to deliver their opinions on the matter. However, they never received a response.

Catholic priest and religious freedom advocate Antonius Benny Susetyo said the government should have negotiated with residents before deciding to relocate them. "Poor people are often considered moveable because they are powerless and lack bargaining power," he said at the Jakarta Legal Aid Foundation (LBH) office.

He said revitalizing housing in the area would be a better solution than forcefully evicting residents. Urban development, Antonius said, should increase the dignity and welfare of the people.

Director of LBH Jakarta Alghiffari Aqsa said a number of human rights violations, including violence, had occurred during evictions, adding that Indonesia was a signatory of a UN covenant on eviction.

"The agreement affirms that evictions are justifiable only if they relate to natural disaster. They also require consent from both sides – the government and the evictees," he said.

According to LBH Jakarta research, the administration carried out 113 evictions in 2015, with 8,315 families evicted and more than 6,283 businesses affected. In another survey, Ghifari said, 84 percent of respondents said they were not involved in discussions before the decision was made to evict them.

"I am afraid that evictions are Ahok's way to gain more popularity among the middle class," Ghifari said, referring to Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama. Ahok needs 532,000 copies of ID cards to run as an independent candidate alongside his running mate Heru Budi Hartono in next year's gubernatorial election.

Environmentalist Chalid Muhammad said Jakarta was a barometer city in Indonesia; its policies often inspired other cities across the country. "We urge the President to issue a policy package to better protect the poor, because evictions in Jakarta are now like a show of force," he said. (fac)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/groups-call-moratorium-evictions.html

Fishermen stage rally on Islet G: 'This was once the sea'

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

Safrin La Batu – Huge banners were held and the rallying cry "stop reclamation" was chanted as hundreds of fishermen packed Muara Angke Port in North Jakarta on Sunday morning.

Male and female fisheries workers, along with members of several civil society organizations, gathered to call for a stop to the ongoing multi-trillion rupiah projects off Jakarta's coast, in the area they say used to supply them with abundant fish.

"Reclamation projects have made fishermen's lives difficult," said one of the fishermen "I am ready to die [to fight] against them". "Say no to reclamation," said another.

A few minutes later, the fishermen boarded dozens of boats and slowly moved to Islet G, one of 17 planned man-made islets. Of the 17, construction has begun on three, including Islet G, which is being developed by Agung Podomoro Land subsidiary PT Muara Wisesa Samudra.

Sunday's rally was closely watched by a number of sturdy men, reportedly security guards employed by PT Muara Wisesa, who told the fishermen to stay in one part of the island.

"This was once the sea, a place where we used to catch fish. It is now a man-made island. This sand has taken away our living," fisherman Mohammad Taher said as he poured sand on his body.

Other fishermen walked around and took selfies. Some of them were heard cursing the island. "I want to spit on this cursed island. I want to step on it," said one of them.

The fishermen also shared a group prayer, asking for God's help to prevent the reclamation projects from materializing.

Before leaving the island, the crowd symbolically sealed it and urged Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama to stop reclamation activities in the area because they were severely damaging the environment and causing fish to leave.

Fisherman Diding Setiawan said his earnings had greatly diminished since the reclamation work began. He said fish in the area had either fled or been killed by mud stirred up or dumped by the reclamation work.

"In the past, I earned up to Rp 4 million (US$305) a day. Now, I only earn Rp 300,000. Sometimes I do not earn anything," he said.

Diding also responded to Ahok's previous statement that the fishermen opposing the reclamation were not real fishermen. "Ahok needs to come and meet us here to check. I am ready to prepare his food if he gets on my boat," said the man who has lived in Muara Angke since 1974.

This was the fishermen's first mass rally on the reclaimed area. Their campaign against the projects gained momentum when a bribery case surrounding construction permits for the work was uncovered recently.

The fishermen had previously filed a petition with the Jakarta Administrative Court (PTUN) against the permit for Islet G, which Ahok issued in 2014. The legal process is ongoing.

One participant of the rally, who preferred to stay anonymous, said support for the fishermen had grown since the KPK revealed the bribery, adding that in the past, only certain groups had given them support. "Now, even a political party has a flag here," he said.

On Wednesday, House of Representatives Commission IV overseeing fisheries and maritime affairs and the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry agreed to declare the project illegal and order the Jakarta administration to freeze the work permits.

Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Susi Pudjiastuti said that the reclamation plan had thus far ignored the interests of the public, with property and port development taking up the majority of plot usage on the reclaimed land. The delay will provide time for the government to assess whether the plans meet legal and environmental requirements.

Ahok responded on Sunday, as reported by beritajakarta.com, that the administration could not stop the reclamation because developers would sue and ask to be paid back their losses, which would amount to trillions of rupiah.

Aside from Muara Wisesa, property and development firms involved in the projects include Agung Sedayu Group subsidiary PT Kapuk Naga Indah, city-owned Jakarta Propertindo and PT Pembangunan Jaya Ancol, and PT Jaladri Kartika Pakci. These and other developers secured controversial permits to develop the artificial islets, planned to cover an area of 5,155 hectares, or half of Bogor city.

The reclamation became controversial after the public learned that Ahok has issued a permit to PT Muara Wisesa Samudra to reclaim Islet G before the City Council even finalized a draft bylaw on zoning and spatial planning that will directly impact on the reclaimed islands.

The Indonesian Traditional Fishermen's Association (KNTI) argue that Jakarta Bay qualifies as a national strategic area, the management of which should be administered by the central government, not a local administration. Therefore, KNTI said, the permit should have been issued by the Indonesian Marine and Fisheries Department, not the Jakarta administration.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/fishermen-stage-rally-islet-g-this-was-once-sea.html

Armed forces & defense

Don't drag military, police into politics again: Rights watchdogs

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

Lawmakers have been warned not to drag the military nor the police into politics by allowing their respective personnel to take part in the upcoming regional elections.

"This idea would open the door for the military and police to engage in politics once again, like during the New Order [1966-1998]," Al Araf, the executive director of human rights watchdog Imparsial, said in Jakarta on Thursday.

Al Araf referred to current deliberations of an amendment to the Regional Election Law by the House of Representatives, of which some factions have proposed to allow soldiers and police officers to seek candidacy in the regional elections without resigning from their military or police posts.

The amendment is being discussed by House Commission II overseeing home affairs. Prevailing law requires soldiers, police officers and civil servants to submit resignation letters if they want to contest an election. However, several fractions, including the Golkar Party and Gerindra Party have expressed their objections to the requirement.

"Soldiers, police officers and civil servants are public posts, while a lawmaker or regional head is a political post. Hence those posts can't be treated the same," Al Araf stressed.

The Indonesian Military (TNI) was known for its dual role concept during the New Order, with members actively involved in politics and business. The military ran newspapers and radio stations and issued recommendation letters for job applications, arrested criminals and settled both large-scale conflicts in Jakarta and disputes in villages. An amendment to the Constitution during the Reform Era removed the military's dual role.

Bahrain, the advocacy director of the Foundation of the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI) said that the participation of military and police officers in the regional elections would contravene the 2004 TNI Law and the 2002 National Police Law, both of which prohibit them from being involved in politics. "The elimination of the resignation requirement will harm the mandate of our democracy," he said. (vps/bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/dont-drag-military-police-into-politics-again-rights-watchdogs.html

Criminal justice & prison system

Indonesia prepares for new round of executions

Sydney Morning Herald - April 20, 2016

Jewel Topsfield and Amilia Rosa, Jakarta – Indonesian prison authorities have been told to prepare for another round of executions on the penal island of Nusakambangan almost a year after eight drug offenders – including Australians Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran- were killed by firing squad.

"We have been informed there will be one [execution round]," Molyanto, the head of the Central Java prison division, told Fairfax Media.

He said authorities were anticipating more prisoners would be put to death this time and therefore an alternative execution site had been chosen on the island, known as Indonesia's Alcatraz.

Fourteen prisoners, most of whom were foreigners, were killed in two separate rounds of executions in Indonesia last year, sparking an international backlash. Several nations, including Australia, temporarily recalled their ambassadors in protest.

"The last execution site is too small for the next one," Mr Molyanto said. "Last time, it was next to Besi prison; this time, it will be next to Batu prison. We have construction in the area, therefore we will build the execution site along with it." He said no timeframe had been given and there was no official list of people to be executed.

President Joko Widodo has maintained the death penalty is necessary "shock therapy" to save Indonesia from the scourge of drugs. However, until now, the Indonesian government has maintained a third round of executions would not be held until the economy improved.

Attorney-General Muhammad Prasetyo this week said he was hopeful a third round of executions would be held this year. He said a mix of foreigners and Indonesians would be put to death, all of whom would be drug offenders because "we are still at war with drugs".

Asked how many would be executed, Mr Prasetyo said: "We are still studying [this] because we have to make sure who [is] still undergoing legal processes and who [has] exhausted their last legal avenue."

Speculation has been mounting about a third round as the anniversary of last year's executions on April 29 approaches.

Some local media outlets have published lists of names of people – including four Nigerians – who were slated for execution. However, the Nigerian embassy told Fairfax Media that one of the names on the list had been granted clemency in 2012 and had returned to Nigeria.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel this week appealed to Mr Joko to abolish capital punishment at a meeting in Berlin. However, Mr Joko said Indonesia was currently at an emergency level in the war against drugs.

"There are between 30 and 50 people in Indonesia dying per day because of drugs," he was quoted saying in The Jakarta Post. "We carry out the legal process on death sentences carefully and we also ensure all rights of the convicts to be fulfilled [during the legal process]."

Source: http://www.smh.com.au/world/indonesia-prepares-for-new-round-of-executions-20160420-gob2z6.html

Foreign affairs & trade

Indonesian president Joko Widodo visits Netherlands

Associated Press - April 22, 2016

The Hague, Netherlands – Indonesian President Joko Widodo paid an official visit to the Netherlands on Friday aimed at drumming up trade and investment from the country that long was Indonesia's colonial ruler.

Widodo started his busy day with a working breakfast with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and the signing of two pacts intensifying cooperation between their countries, before heading to a new extension to the port of Rotterdam.

Widodo's visit is the first by a leader of the former Dutch colony since Abdurraham Wahid in 2000. In 2010, then-President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono canceled a visit at the last minute amid moves by a separatist group to have him arrested for alleged human rights violations.

Separatists from the Maluku region of Indonesia who have long lived in the Netherlands sought to speak with Widodo during his visit Friday, but said this week that the Dutch government had not responded to their request to set up a meeting.

A Dutch-based group of activists from Indonesia's restive West Papua region danced and chanted outside Parliament, although Widodo was not in Parliament at the time. The president was at a beachfront hotel giving a speech to members of the Dutch business community.

"We want to make a statement to the Dutch government that they should not only discuss economic interests (with Widodo), but also human rights violations," demonstrator Raki Ap said. "We want a referendum on self-determination like recent votes in Catalonia and Scotland," he added.

In Indonesia, Papuan pro-independence activists have been given lengthy prison terms for peacefully expressing their views, organizing rallies or raising separatist flags.

Though Indonesia's sovereignty over Papua was formalized in 1969 through a stage-managed vote, a small, poorly armed separatist movement has battled for independence ever since.

Earlier, after the breakfast at Rutte's official residence in The Hague, Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi signed two memorandums of understanding with the Dutch ministers for education and infrastructure and environment aimed at intensifying cooperation in the fields of maritime industries and higher education and science.

Infrastructure and Environment Minister Melanie Schultz van Haegen said the maritime deal would help boost Indonesia's economy. "Indonesia can create many new jobs and there are many opportunities for Dutch business," she said in a statement.

Later Friday, Widodo was visiting King Willem-Alexander at a palace in The Hague.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2016/04/22/world/europe/ap-eu-netherlands-indonesia.html

Indonesian exports to Europe in decline

Jakarta Post - April 19, 2016

Anton Hermansyah – President Joko Widodo's visit to Europe shows the government's concern over declining European Union (EU) trade with Indonesia. Experts have argued that this decline is due to product mismatch.

According to data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), Indonesia's exports to Europe decreased by 5.6 percent annually over the last five years. The slump in trade in 2015 hit 11.74 percent, while the balance of trade dropped by 12.9 percent.

"It is because the European market demands products, while we still depend on commodities," said Institute for Development of Economics and Finance (INDEF) director Enny Sri Hartati to thejakartapost.com on Monday.

She said there was high demand for handicraft products like wood carving and jewelry. "We registered exports of US$973 million to France in 2015 and 43 percent of it was jewelry," she said.

She blamed Indonesian trade attaches for not actively seeking and delivering trade information to help Indonesian traders improve their export performance.

"Foreign trade attaches are really active in Indonesia. They even come to us, analysts and economists, every month to dig out information," she said. In 2015, total Indonesian trade with EU members amounted to $26.1 billion with a trade surplus of $3.5 billion. Germany is Indonesia's biggest trade partner, with trade worth $6.1 billion, followed by the Netherlands with $4.2 billion in trade.

"The EU is still a good market despite economic sluggishness in Europe. There are opportunities, especially in Eastern Europe," economist Faisal Basri said. (ags)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/19/indonesian-exports-to-europe-in-decline.html

Economy & investment

Indonesia one of the world's top 10 manufacturers

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

Ayomi Amindoni – Indonesia has been listed as one of the world's top 10 manufacturers by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO).

According to UNIDO's 2016 International Yearbook of Industrial Statistics, Indonesia's manufacturing industry accounts for almost a quarter of the country's GDP. "The UNIDO report shows that Indonesia has climbed into the top ten list," Shadia Hajarabi, UNIDO's representative in Indonesia, said in Jakarta on Thursday.

"Indonesia is at the bottom of the list, but it surpasses England and Canada," Shyam Upadhyaya, a statistician at UNIDO, said. Shyam added that the list was based on total volume of production. China is at the top list, followed by the US, Germany, Korea and India. "Indonesia has become an important industrial country," he added.

Shyam explained that China and India used to have higher economic growth compared to Indonesia. In recent years, however, economic conditions in those countries have fluctuated, resulting in economic slowdowns. "Indonesia's economy has been relatively stable compared to other countries in the region," he said.

He explained that the government had succeeded in maintaining the inflation rate at 4.5 percent and had lifted 25 million people out of poverty.

"In 2010, there were 50 million poor people in the country. Now it is almost half," Shyam explained, adding that this figure indicated that Indonesia could rely on the domestic market to boost economic growth instead of relying solely on exports. "If you can maintain these indicators, it could produce higher growth," he went on to say.

Dyah Winarni Poedjiwati, an expert staffer at the Industry Ministry, said Indonesia's manufacturing industry grew 5.04 percent in 2015, higher than the national economic growth rate of 4.79 percent. The metals and electricity industry recorded the highest growth rate at 7.9 percent. Food and beverages rose 7.54 percent and the machinery and equipment industry grew 7.49 percent.

"The manufacturing industry contributed 18 percent to gross domestic product in 2015, worth around Rp 298 trillion. This is an increase from the previous year, which saw the manufacturing industry contribute 17.89 percent to GDP," he explained.

She said, however, that the trade balance in manufacturing products experienced a deficit of US$2.31 billion last year, with exports reaching $106.64 billion, or 71 percent of total exports. Total exports reached $150.25 billion, while the value of imports was recorded at 108.95 billion.

Meanwhile, according to the Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM), foreign direct investment declined by 9.65 percent in 2015, from $13.01 billion in 2014 to $11.76 billion. At the same time, domestic investment grew 5.8 percent to Rp 41.84 trillion. (bbn)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/indonesia-one-of-the-worlds-top-10-manufacturers.html

Indonesia inches closer to middle income trap: experts

Jakarta Post - April 18, 2016

Anton Hermansyah – Current economic policies have yet to show adequate support for the development of the manufacturing industry, which may lead the country further into the middle income trap, experts have said.

Institute for Development of Economics and Finance (INDEF) director Enny Sri Hartati said the fair economic growth in the country was supported by low value-added commodity, while the highly value-added manufacturing sectors were down.

"We were focused on natural resources, that's where the economy is concentrated. Small and micro industries never ascend to medium and large industries, and 99 percent of the economic structure is the same," she said on Monday in Jakarta.

Economist Faisal Basri underlined that the key to avoid the middle-income trap was to maintain the performance of manufacturing sectors, like South Korea did in the 1970's when its economic and political conditions were similar to that of Indonesia today.

"Since 2001, Indonesia has prioritized mining and agricultural commodities export and has been less-supportive of manufacturing," Faisal said, further explaining that, to avoid the middle income trap, the government needed to focus on industrialization and support it with a strong political will.

Emphasizing that the current tools for economic empowerment were different to those of the past, Emil Salim, an economist during the New Order era, suggested that the solution to avoid the middle income trap was to be found among Indonesian youth. "The ones who will bring us out from the middle income trap are the youngsters with their updated technology," he said. (ags)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/18/indonesia-inches-closer-to-middle-income-trap-experts.html

Industrialization should be prime driver of Indonesia's economy: Committee

Jakarta Post - April 17, 2016

Ayomi Amindoni – The National Economic and Industry Committee (KEIN) has said industrialization should be the locomotive pulling Indonesia's economic growth.

KEIN chairman Sutrisno Bachir said Indonesia could no longer rely on raw commodity exports to boost the country's economic growth amid a sluggish global economy.

"We are in a difficult situation. We should tighten our belts and be smart in dealing with this situation," he said at the State Palace on Friday.

Sutrisno said the newly established committee was set to compose a re-industrialization roadmap as part of its effort to analyze the government's plan to boost domestic manufacturing.

"KEIN will actively provide strategic input in the fields of the economy and industry, not only in the form of papers, but also directly to all communities and regions," he said.

Citing an example, Sutrisno said KEIN would monitor the industrialization and new industry projects that were currently under construction in several regions.

"We aim to boost industrialization in the country, which is now depressed. That's our main program. We realize we will miss a lot of opportunities if we only export raw commodities amid the global economic slowdown," said Sutrisno, who was formerly chairman of the National Mandate Party's (PAN) advisory council.

He said KEIN would cooperate with relevant ministries to strengthen the role of industry in Indonesia's economic growth, including by encouraging the country's citizens to use domestic products instead of imported goods.

"We should be able to follow other countries such as Korea, Japan and India, which are praised for their spirit of nationalism regarding their domestic products," he said.

KEIN secretary Putri K. Wardhani said the ongoing sluggish global economy had led to decreasing exports and increases in imports. To change this situation, Indonesia must increase the use of domestic products.

She said the committee had requested recommendations from industrialization architects such as Emil Salim and BJ Habibie to synchronize Indonesia's past industrialization patterns with the current economic situation.

"They both said that to reach double-digit economic growth, industries must be the locomotive of the Indonesian economy and this must be supported by the finance and trade sectors," she said. (ebf)

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/17/industrialization-should-be-prime-driver-of-indonesias-economy-committee.html

Analysis & opinion

After half a century, Indonesia opens a debate about its darkest year

The Economist - April 22, 2016

In little more than a decade, starting in 1965, Asia suffered four man-made catastrophes apart from the Vietnam war; altogether they cost millions of lives. China endured the Cultural Revolution. Bangladesh was born amid horror and mass slaughter. In Cambodia Pol Pot's Khmers Rouges inflicted genocide on their own countrymen. And in Indonesia hundreds of thousands of suspected communist sympathisers died in 1965-66 as the then General Suharto consolidated what was to become a 32-year dictatorship. None of these disasters has been subject to a thorough public accounting, let alone a truth-and-reconciliation process. Of the four, however, Indonesia's has been the least examined at home. Unlike the others, it has remained a taboo topic; its survivors still suffer censorship, discrimination and persecution.

So a symposium held this week in Jakarta, the capital, titled "Dissecting the 1965 tragedy", was remarkable. Human-rights groups, former army officers, government representatives, victims' families and survivors met in a public forum. Opinions on the worth of the exercise varied. That it happened at all prompted protests from some Islamic groups, seeing, implausibly, the thin end of a communist-revival wedge. Government spokesmen questioned the scale of the killings being discussed. Even some of the activists, who for decades have been urging Indonesia to face up to the carnage, saw the symposium less as historic breakthrough than as history rewritten.

How many died that year is unknown. It started with the murder of six generals in the early hours of October 1st 1965. This was blamed on an alleged coup attempt by the Indonesian Communist Party, or PKI. Purging the country of supposed PKI sympathisers meant murdering, by one common guess, 500,000 people. Haris Azhar of Kontras, a charity that campaigns for the rights of the victims, thinks it was between 1m and 2m, with a far larger number affected in other ways: by imprisonment, torture, forced labour, rape or exile. The obscurity is deliberate. Suharto held power until 1998; twice as much time to bury the truth as to unearth it. But the period is still glossed over in school history lessons and books about it are banned.

Its shadow falls across islands where millions live side-by-side with former tormentors or victims. An estimated 40m are still excluded from government jobs because of their families' alleged association with the PKI. Some of the bloodiest massacres happened in Java and Bali, but violence scarred most of the archipelago. Indonesia, hiding its past, never learns its lessons. The grim techniques of control that were honed during the terror were later used with disastrous effect against faraway secessionist movements: East Timor (now Timor-Leste), Aceh and Papua.

It counts as progress that the symposium drew together so many people on both sides of the killings – or at least their children. One of the organisers was Agus Widjojo, an intellectual former general and a son of one of the six assassinated in 1965. One delegate was the daughter of D.N. Aidit, leader of the PKI at the time – when only the Soviet Union and China had larger communist parties. Another was Sukmawati Sukarnoputri, one of the daughters of Sukarno, Indonesia's founding president, who was squeezed out of power by Suharto in 1966.

Yet the former army men and the government seemed to cast doubt on whether there was anything to discuss at all, dismissing the notion that hundreds of thousands had died. A retired general, Sintong Panjaitan, said the figure was closer to 80,000. Another former general, Luhut Panjaitan (no relation), now the government's security minister, went further: "I don't believe the number was more than 1,000; probably fewer."

Some activists claimed that the symposium, a worthy idea of academics and NGOs, had been "hijacked" by the government. Mr Haris of Kontras boycotted it, arguing it was designed to portray the tragedy as the result of a "social conflict" between rival groups – ie, ignoring the "dirty hand" of the government and army. Others, however, such as Andreas Harsono, of Human Rights Watch, a New York-based lobby group, welcomed the symposium as a "tiny" but important first step. Optimists hope it will be followed by other meetings round the country and so, at long last, by a national reckoning. The generals' estimates of the death toll may be ludicrously understated, but at least they open the way for a discussion about the real numbers.

Many hoped that the administration of Joko Widodo, the president elected in 2014, might be happy to open such a debate. The first president from outside the old elite, with no military links, he seemed to have much to gain. But maybe the Islamic groups, the army and others opposed to open discussion have more political clout, even today, than survivors and victims' descendants. Mr Luhut ruled out any government apology, and appeared to see calls for openness as a foreign plot, thundering: "I'll be damned if this country is controlled by other countries."

The sound of silence

Perhaps he was thinking of the part played in raising awareness of the slaughter by two harrowing, prizewinning documentaries ("The Act of Killing" and "The Look of Silence") by an American film-maker, Joshua Oppenheimer. But in fact for years the West connived in the silence: America, Britain and other countries were aware of the massacres. In 1966 Australia's prime minister, Harold Holt, seemed pleased that Indonesia had been straightened out, telling an audience in New York that "with 500,000 to 1m communist sympathisers knocked off... I think it is safe to assume a reorientation has taken place." It is not only inside Indonesia that an examination of the year of living dangerously raises embarrassing questions about the cold war and its effect on basic human values. But it is Indonesia that has to live with the consequences, and Indonesians, above all, who are demanding truth in the hope that one day justice and reconciliation may follow.

Source: http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21697252-after-half-century-indonesia-opens-debate-about-its-darkest-year-open-wounds

Proxy wars narrative: TNI-AD's quest for relevance? – Analysis

Eurasia Review - April 22, 2016

Keoni Marzuki – Indonesia's Military Commander, General Gatot Nurmantyo, has frequently articulated his concern over proxy wars that have the potential of ripping the country apart. He emphasised that such a threat is intangible and its impact on national cohesiveness is serious.

This form of threat, according to General Nurmantyo, does not propagate organically, but is orchestrated vicariously by foreign entities wishing to assume direct control over the country's resources such as food, water and energy, through the use of strategically-placed domestic collaborators or subsidiaries, namely NGOs, media, social interest groups and individuals.

Forms of proxy war

According to General Nurmantyo, there are at least three forms of proxy wars which Indonesia currently faces, namely secessionist movements, inter-group conflicts and mass demonstrations organised, assisted and funded by foreign entities. The degradation of moral and nationalistic values, especially on the youth, as well as emerging religious radicalisation and infiltration of foreign culture and values are also frequently mentioned by the military as parts of various proxy wars to weaken the nation's unity.

The key in addressing the challenge posed by the amorphous threat of proxy war, at least according to the Army, TNI-AD, is to enhance Indonesia's resilience in various aspects. Initiatives aimed to bolster resiliency, for example the "serbuan territorial" (territorial invasion) initiative that emphasises societal and physical development at the rural-local level, are precisely the proper response to be implemented to counteract the threat. Other initiatives, such as "Bela Negara" (State Defence) programme, complement the former initiative by reinforcing core national values such as Pancasila, which is grounded on the values of religion, human rights, national unity, democracy and social justice.

Arguably, the thesis of the proxy wars threat is not novel as noted by various articles and reports. In fact, this siege mentality has been championed by General Nurmantyo when he served as the Army Chief of Staff and can be traced back to the time when he served as the Commander of the Army Strategic Reserve Command (KOSTRAD).

Proxy war narrative and Indonesian insularity?

There are indeed several possible drivers that shape and influence the genesis of the proxy war narrative. First, it could be the inward-looking doctrine of the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI), with emphasis on TNI-AD as the guardian of the state. This doctrine persists and continues to be preached religiously within the teaching institution even after the era of military reform.

Second, there is a widely-held belief about Indonesia as a staging ground for proxy wars in the past particularly during the chaos of the early and mid-1960s. Third, the current leadership lacks exposure to foreign military education and/or exercises, thus entrenching their insularity.

The proxy war narrative, as elaborated by General Nurmantyo, indicates the prevalence of the insular paradigm, at least within the TNI-AD, following efforts of military reform that were 'concluded' in 2004. The systematic diffusion of the narrative down to the rankand-file at regional commands across the archipelago, however, indicates efforts to perpetuate the paradigm across the TNI-AD structure.

In addition to internal diffusion, it has spread further into the Ministry of Defence, as reflected, some say arguably, by the recent comments of the Defence Minister, General (Ret.) Ryamizard Ryacudu, regarding the LGBT issue in Indonesia as mendacious foreign influences that are utilised to precipitate dissent in society.

Military operations other than war?

The absence of a clear and definite outline of what constitute tangible evidence of proxy wars and the loose usage of the narrative may present a problem in the era of reformasi. It may well be used as an avenue for the military, especially the Army, to justify greater involvement in civilian policy implementation under the blanket rubric of "Operasi Militer Selain Perang" (Military Operations Other Than War).

Minister Ryacudu's recent comment on the pro-LGBT movement as a form of proxy war indicates that the narrative is elastic and can be stretched or moulded to suit a variety of different issues and interests that lies beyond the directives of the TNI and the Ministry of Defence.

The whole narrative of proxy wars can easily be perceived as the intention of strengthening TNI involvement in internal security. It should be noted, however, that the involvement of the military in civilian affairs has been established and defined, albeit ambiguously, within the 2004 Law on TNI. Additionally, military involvement on civilian affairs requires political decision from civilian leadership on either the national or regional level.

Quest for relevance

A recent report by the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC) argues that the main value of the proxy war narrative for the Indonesian military is its unique fusion of international and domestic threats utilised as rhetoric to strengthen the TNI's role in internal security. This is achieved by means of a greater level of engagement with civilians – critical in repelling the external threat of proxy wars. Such a perspective is indeed valid.

However, the proxy wars narrative, and subsequent initiatives to repel it, possibly serves a greater purpose for the TNI-AD as a response to Indonesia's turn towards a maritime-oriented outlook. Alternatively, the narrative may serve as a response to the advent of fourth generation warfare whereby means of combat or force devolves into non-physical forms. Nevertheless, fully implemented and enforced, President Joko Widodo's Global Maritime Fulcrum strategy would potentially diminish the role of the TNI-AD as the dominant service in external defence and its replacement by the Navy, TNI-AL, as the leading service.

The shift to a maritime focus signifies a number of possibilities for the TNI-AD, most of which would compromise its status as Indonesia's stalwart protector. Most critically, however, the maritime-oriented shift calls for substantial resource re-allocation to critical sectors – in this case the TNI-AL – thus rendering the Army vulnerable to potential budget cuts on which it may not be able to maintain its primacy and legacy.

As such, it has to adapt to the changing environment and find a way to preserve its relevance under the Global Maritime Fulcrum vision. However, pushing the idea of proxy wars may not significantly enhance the Army's capacity and capability to operate in the maritime domain either.

[Keoni Marzuki is a Research Analyst at the Indonesia Programme, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.]

Source: http://www.eurasiareview.com/22042016-proxy-wars-narrative-tni-ads-quest-for-relevance-analysis/

Manipulation of Kartini symbol must end

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2016

Faiza Mardzoeki – In the early 20th century, a woman not yet 20 years old, named Kartini, thought a lot about the people of her time, especially women.

Not long ago came the sad news on the death of a young woman from a village in the West Java regency of Karawang, a 29-year-old dangdut singer named Irma Bule, who left behind three children.

She died after being bitten by a poisonous snake during a performance. Irma Bule worked hard, singing from village to village, with a snake as a gimmick. It appears she used the snake, not only as an extra attraction to her performance, but also to keep audience members, usually men, at bay.

Irma represents most Indonesian women. Hundreds of thousands of young women travel overseas to work as domestic workers without adequate protection from sexual and physical abuse and extreme exploitation. Irma was also the other face of the domestic helpers or maids in Indonesia who have no rights as workers but rely only on their employers' benevolence.

As an activist working with maids and their families for several years, I have seen the horrors they suffer: rejected by hospitals because they had no money, scarred for life by the cruelty of employers, sources of profit for the hordes of "agents" shipping them overseas.

Then there are the thousands working for a pittance at malls, hotels, cafes and beauty salons. Hundreds of thousands more work long shifts in factories on a paltry minimum wage – if they are lucky – and also often face sexual harassment.

I witnessed close the lines of aching backs and fingers of hundreds of young women slaving for less than the minimum wage in factories on the edge of Jakarta, on so-called "long shifts", scared even of asking permission to go to the toilet.

And many, like Irma, end up forced into the dark alleys of prostitution and even become victims of trafficking. That is the fate of most women in the real Indonesia. The feminism that focuses only on a slogan demanding "the freedom to be me" won't resonate among that majority.

The freedom they seek is from structural abuse and exploitation, from poverty and sexism that poverty, and the exhaustion it can cause, forces them to endure. I do not mean to be pessimistic about the future of Indonesian women. However, real change will only happen if we face reality honestly.

Kartini was designated a national hero by Sukarno in 1964. Since then, every April 21, Kartini's birthday, the country is invited to celebrate the "the success" of Indonesian women.

In celebrations, women and girls are paraded in a kebaya blouse, their hair in a sanggul or traditional bun, or they join competitions like cooking. Today, there are often also fashion shows or discounts at malls for those women with the money to enjoy consumerism.

But who was Kartini and what did she think? Indonesian men and women living under the New Order regime know little about her.

The beautiful and sharp writings of this heroine are still not taught at school with any seriousness, just as the real, everyday work and social situation of most women is never seriously discussed.

Any idealization of Kartini, without adequate discussion of what she struggled for, collides with everyday reality, as experienced by Irma Bule and by the hundreds of thousands of women migrant workers and the tens of millions of others living in poverty or just above it.

But why are they absent from public conversation? Or where they are present, they are used for distorted symbolic purposes. The National Awakening Party (PAN) recently elevated another dangdut singer, Zaskia Gotik, as their ambassador to promote the state ideology of Pancasila.

Then the Defense Ministry, not wanting to be outdone, appointed her as a doctor for the so-called Pancasila Clinic. Zaskia is renowned for two things. One was her "sexy duck wiggle" which has catapulted her to fame and earned her celebrity status.

The other was her notoriety after answering a question on Pancasila saucily, incurring criticism for being disrespectful. Asked about the symbol on the national emblem representing the fifth principle of social justice, she answered "a duck bending over". The correct answer is a picture of rice and cotton.

Politicians and state officials are easily smitten with the popularity of a celebrity (usually female ones) who they then make spokespersons on important issues. It is the gimmick of hypocrisy.

Kartini Day celebrations are meaningless if the real situation of most women is not addressed, if Irma Bule is ignored.

Such celebrations will only turn into hypocrisy when most women are still entangled in poverty, when they face great risks of death during childbirth due to lack of nutrition and a lack of access to health care.

Also, the actual words and ideas of Kartini must be made available, especially to women and young people. It would not at all be beyond the government's means to reprint on a massive scale Kartini's collection of letters titled "Habis Gelap Terbitlah Terang" (Out of darkness into light) and distribute the collection to all schools and sell it cheaply in bookshops.

The manipulation of Kartini and of women as a symbol must end. The real Kartini must be studied. The real life of the majority of women must be understood.

Perhaps getting the state to help achieve Article Five of Pancasila, namely social justice for all the Indonesian people, including women, is going to need us, women and men, to act together.

[The writer is a playwright, a theater producer and director and the founder of Institut Ungu (Purple Institute, Women's Art and Cultural Space).]

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/21/manipulation-kartini-symbol-must-end.html

Dispatches: Indonesia's step toward accountability for 1965 massacres

Human Rights Watch - April 20, 2016

Andreas Harsono – I've spent the last two days in a Jakarta hotel listening to more than 20 hours of recollections of Indonesia's most sensitive, taboo topic: the state-orchestrated 1965-66 massacres that killed more than 500,000 people.

A two-day government-supported symposium, "Dissecting the 1965 Tragedy: An Historical Approach," provided an unprecedented public forum for discussion about the grisly details of the atrocities of 50 years ago. The official narrative has long treated those killings as a justified and heroic response against an Indonesian Communist Party plot to overthrow the government, which began with the murder of six army generals on September 30, 1965.

The symposium allowed Indonesians to hear an alternate account from survivors of the killings and family members of the victims. They described crimes by government security forces and paramilitary groups under their control, including mass executions and kidnappings, rampant rape and unlawful detention. They described how the government extended the injustice of those crimes through decades of discrimination against an estimated 40 million surviving accused "communists" and their descendants. The symposium evoked the more visceral moments of documentary filmmaker Joshua Oppenheimer's award-winning films about the massacres, "The Act of Killing" and "The Look of Silence."

Indonesian government officials at the symposium were clearly uncomfortable with this very public airing of details of alleged gross human rights abuses. Indonesia's security minister, Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, challenged the accuracy of the estimated half-million death toll and ruled out the possibility of an official apology for those abuses. But the symposium's chairman, retired general Agus Widjojo, who himself is the son of one of the murdered generals of September 1965, urged participants – mostly elderly men and women – to tell their stories. Widjojo also dismissed allegations, made by nationalist groups that oppose accountability for the massacres, that the symposium was an effort "to revive communism."

The symposium captivated the interest of the Indonesian public. The hashtag #Simposium65 and #Ingat65 became a trending topic on Twitter as Indonesian television beamed near-non-stop coverage of the event along with its stream of heart-wrenching testimonies nationwide. The symposium was a very tentative first step toward what hopefully will become a meaningful, sustained, and public truth-telling process about the events of 1965-66, and justice for the victims. The question remains whether the Indonesian government has the political courage to pursue that justice.

Source: https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/04/20/dispatches-indonesias-step-toward-accountability-1965-massacres

Why European leaders must challenge Indonesia President Joko Widodo on human rights

Newsweek - April 19, 2016

Papang Hidayat – She was the only woman on the stage. On either side stood uniformed men, their stern gaze bearing down on her. The 60-year-old woman from Indonesia's Aceh province had been dragged out in front of a crowd to be punished for allegedly selling alcohol. Wearing a ite robe and loose-fitting headscarf that obscured her face, she remained as anonymous as the hooded figure looming over her, brandishing a cane. In all, she received 30 strikes, becoming the first non-Muslim to be caned in Aceh since Indonesian authorities there introduced a controversial brand of Sharia law.

She wasn't, however, the first woman to be punished in this cruel and inhumane way. A widely circulated video from December 2015 shows a younger Muslim woman being caned for supposedly drifting into "close proximity" of a man she wasn't married to. In the video, the woman is shown emitting a cry of anguish each time the cane snapped against her back. Before the cane could be raised for a fifth time, she fell forward, head first, on to the stage, unable to bear the pain any longer.

When Indonesia's President Joko Widodo, also known as 'Jokowi,' tours Europe this week, it will be as the leader of over 250 million people and a nearly $900 billion economy, expected to continue growing over the next five years at a steady clip of over 5 percent. After meetings in Germany, he will be received by officials in Brussels, and then be feted by U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne for two days. His final stop will be at The Hague, in the Netherlands, the seat of international justice.

It would be a travesty if, in their conversations with President Widodo this week, European leaders did not match their interest in Indonesia's resilient economy with questions about the country's enduring human rights issues.

When he was elected in 2014, President Widodo made a series of commitments to human rights, encouraging hopes of change – provoking comparisons with U.S. President Barack Obama's rhetoric, and not just the two men's slight physical resemblance. He promised to address historic human rights abuses, protect freedom of religion, combat intolerance, implement police reforms, defend women's rights, and protect Indonesia's indigenous people. On most of these fronts, and others, Amnesty International has recorded a worrying trend in the wrong direction.

As detailed in our annual death penalty report, in 2015, a year when the number of countries in the world who have abolished the death penalty became a majority, Indonesia executed 14 people. Within weeks of coming to power, President Widodo balked at suggestions that they should be granted clemency. Earlier this month, the Indonesian Attorney General announced plans for 10 more people to be executed. To this end, he has even managed to secure a budget for the planned executions.

President Widodo is not entirely oblivious to the injustice of the death penalty. In cases involving Indonesians sentenced to death abroad, especially in Saudi Arabia and Malaysia, his government has offered them support. At home, sadly, President Widodo has insisted that the death penalty should serve as a deterrent, a notion that lacks credible evidence. In some cases, the death sentences handed down by Indonesian courts were the product of manifestly flawed legal proceedings. By our estimates, there are currently over 180 people on death row in Indonesia.

Indonesia's jails have also worryingly come to house new prisoners of conscience, dimming hopes that the release in 2015 of Filep Karma, a peaceful protester jailed for over a decade, would prompt further releases. Earlier this month, political activist Steven Itlay was charged with having committed "rebellion" and faces life imprisonment. Johan Teterissa, a former schoolteacher and political activist from Maluku province, remains behind bars eight years after his arrest. His crime was to have led a peaceful demonstration, performed a traditional war dance, and unfurled a banned Malukan flag. In Maluka, Amnesty knows of 29 prisoners of conscience, and a further 27 in the restive easternmost region of Papua, where just this month peaceful protests were met by police arrests in seven different cities. Far from breaking with Indonesia's past, it appears to be business as usual. Indeed, as the bruises administered to the 60-year-old woman last week will attest, the scope of human rights abuses in Indonesia is widening.

The European leaders who meet President Widodo this week might consider asking what her name is, and whether he recalls the hopeful pledges he made to her and millions of other Indonesians two years ago.

[Papang Hidayat is Amnesty International's Indonesia Researcher.]

Source: http://www.newsweek.com/why-european-leaders-must-challenge-indonesia-president-joko-widodo-human-449521

Free expression suffers as conservatives prevail in culture wars

Jakarta Post - April 17, 2016

Endy M. Bayuni – There is no doubt that the public space for free expression in Indonesia is gradually shrinking and, tragically, successive democratically elected governments have played a role in the deterioration of our freedoms.

The banning of public discussions and stage performances has become too frequent to be ignored, but sadly the nation, which only won its freedom 16 years ago, appears to be complacent. Few people speak up against the erosion of freedom.

Religion may be part of the reason, but the larger explanation is that Indonesia, the country with the world's largest Muslim population, is simply becoming more and more conservative. The claim that Indonesians have become more religious is debatable.

There was the monologue performance about national hero Tan Malaka in Bandung that had to be canceled on police orders in March, and only through the intervention of Mayor Ridwan Kamil went ahead a day late. There was no such intervention the following week when police stopped a pantomime performance in the same city.

Many public discussions, including those held in universities, have been stopped on various pretexts, whether it be the theme, the speakers or simply because some people objected to them.

There was the discussion about the leftist movement in the country in Jakarta. In another case, a discussion organized by the Islamic Students Association (HMI) in Pekanbaru, Riau, was stopped because one of the speakers was a Shia, a minority group in the nation of predominantly Sunni Muslims.

The targets keep widening.

The entire lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community is now suffering officially sanctioned public persecution, which the state started. The spiritual cult Gerakan Fajar Nusantara, with tens of thousands of followers, has now been officially banned by the government because it is considered a national threat.

In banning public discussions and performances, the police have invoked the need to maintain security and order, or simply said that these events did not have the necessary permit, a throwback to the days of the authoritarian Soeharto regime.

Conservatives are winning the Indonesian culture wars to the point that children are being told by teachers at school not to blow out candles when celebrating their birthdays because such a practice is "un-Islamic". Many parents, who most likely grew up blowing out candles each year on their birthdays, have complied.

Indonesia is undergoing a culture war of its own that is pitting conservatives against, for lack of a better term, liberals. Nowhere is this war felt more than in the public sphere. With the room for free expression shrinking, conservatives are gaining the upper hand. For now.

It is a war that most people, except for the few who are directly engaged in it, are not aware of, even as they lose their freedom. It is a silent war, but one that is fought fiercely as both camps try to win the hearts and minds of 250 million people.

As Indonesia becomes like any modern society, the culture war is arguably the one that really matters in determining the fate and future of the nation. Indonesians have become divided along the conservative-liberal fault line.

The conservatives are winning because they are far more prepared and more united. Several books have been written about the "conservative turn" in Indonesia, with religion being the primary, though not the only, weapon used by the conservatives in waging their war on liberals.

They'd like to think that God is on their side. In a country where religion plays an important part of people's lives, such claim can give them some advantage.

Conservative Islamic organizations, including political parties, are riding on the conservative tide. Their Islamist agenda, including turning Indonesia into an Islamic state or making sharia the law of the land, is coming to the surface.

The extent to which they can push their agenda and be accepted by the public remains debatable. In the last 2014 general elections, all political parties that pushed an Islamist agenda performed poorly, suggesting that the conservative turn has not gone so far as to seriously influence the nation's political choices.

Indonesian liberals in contrast are far less prepared for this war and are only putting up a meek or timid resistance. They are also a diverse lot, but the difference is that they are not as united as the conservatives.

The conservatives have succeeded in their campaign to publicly discredit liberals by associating them with the evil West. "Neolibs" is now the catchall phrase to attack anyone who disagrees or opposes their conservative politics. Some Cabinet ministers who are more "market-oriented" are branded as neolibs and accused of being a danger to the nation.

The liberals are also too busy engaging in elitist and intellectual discussions, whereas the conservatives are aggressively recruiting converts at the grassroots level.

But is Indonesia really experiencing a "conservative turn", or is this simply "the turn of the conservatives" after a period in which the liberals have prevailed? Will the pendulum not swing back to the left as usually happens in culture wars in modern societies?

We can take comfort in the fact that there are enough moderating forces in the country to keep the nation from moving too far to the right or too far to the left. But the pendulum is not going to swing back to the center on its own.

The liberals need to take this war more seriously. First and foremost, they need to fight to open up the public space for free expression, before it shrinks so much that their voices disappear.

Conservatives may be wining the battles, but they haven't won the war. They have had their turn. It is only a matter of time before the tide turns.

[The writer is editor-in-chief of The Jakarta Post.]

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2016/04/17/free-expression-suffers-conservatives-prevail-culture-wars.html