October 2000

Views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily of the AFSC.

The Killing Continues in Indonesia

Matt Easton is a Cambridge-based consultant who has worked as an observer in East Timor with the Carter Center and as a researcher in Aceh for Human Rights Watch.

A year ago I sat on the porch of the rectory in Suai, East Timor, talking to Father Hilario. In the courtyard below, several thousand people were living in makeshift tents after fleeing military-backed militias in the run-up to the September 30 referendum on independence from Indonesia. I asked Father Hilario if he thought stopping Indonesian military support would end the militia's campaign of intimidation. "Immediately," he said. "They would never act without it."

The East Timorese voted overwhelmingly for independence, and then suffered a scorched-earth campaign by the militias, still backed by the military. Hundreds were killed and thousands forced over into Indonesian West Timor. In one of the bloodiest incidents, Father Hilario and some of those seeking refuge with him were killed in an attack on the compound. Their bodies were later discovered in a mass grave just over the border.

It is now a year later. East Timor sent its first athletes to the Olympics, and the foundations of a new nation are in place, despite the destruction and displacement. But 120,000 East Timorese are still across the border in camps dominated by militias that appear to be increasingly well-armed and organized. On September 6, militia members went on a rampage after the funeral of militia leader Olivio Mendonca Moruk, said to have been decapitated in a dispute with a local gangster. The mob killed three foreign UN workers and nine Timorese, while Indonesian security forces once again stood by.

The same day, villagers found five corpses in a ravine on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. One month earlier, New York-based Acehnese activist Jafar Siddiq Hamzah had disappeared while setting up an office to monitor human rights in his home province of Aceh, where an ongoing separatist struggle has been met with gross human rights abuses by the military. Knowing he would be at risk, Jafar checked in with relatives every two hours. On August 5, the calls stopped, and there was no further news until his body was found with four others, tortured and unrecognizable--only after an autopsy and medical records from NY matched up surgical scars could an identification be made. Given Jafar's stance on political freedoms, the military is probably behind Jafar's death, but there have been no arrests.

Having been the target of Jafar's soft-spoken determination in the past (in Aceh last January he persuaded me to ride with him on a back-roads dash to the airport so that a foreigner would be present in case he was stopped at a roadblock), I know that his quiet dedication had done a great deal to raise awareness of little-known Aceh in the US. Jafar chaired the International Federation for Aceh, testified before Congress, and organized a conference in Aceh that brought human rights activists together to address abuses.

Unlike Jafar's killing, the deaths of the UN staff on the eve of the UN Millennium Summit became an international issue. The Security Council called on Indonesia to disarm and disband the militias, ensure the safety of refugees and humanitarian workers, and prevent incursions into East Timor. In response, Indonesia played down the existence of the militias, refused to accept a Security Council delegation, blamed Australian spies for the deaths, and even quibbled over the word "disarm." Six suspects were detained in the UN killings, including several soldiers, but all six were reportedly then released. In the last week of September the Indonesian army started what it alled a persuasive effort to disarm the militias. This effort, termed "pathetic" by the UN Transitional Administor, netted mostly hande-made weapons and prompted militias to mass outside of Atambua and even seize back some of the surrendered weapons. On Sept. 28, the army began operations to take weapons by force, but skepticism remains that they will be effective.

The connection between the killing of Jafar and the twelve killed in West Timor is two-fold. They demonstrate that bringing perpetrators to trial is not just a matter of justice for the East Timorese; the future of Indonesia itself is at stake. Indonesia's own struggle to institute the rule of law suffers gravely in the absence of accountability. Sidney Jones, Asia Director for Human Rights Watch, notes that "Indonesia's experiment in democracy is likely to fail if the government in Jakarta proves unable to control lawless elements, including within its own armed forces."

A second but related issue that connects the killings is that both were preceded by escalating violence that was not handled seriously by Indonesia or the international community. Accountability is a deterrent, and its absence is an invitation to greater abuses. Repeated border incursions and violence in the camps were met only with continued support from the Indonesian military and occasional statements from the international community, and the militias' actions escalated. In Aceh the disappearance of a parliamentarian off the streets of Medan and the deaths of other activists earlier this year resulted in no arrests, so Jafar suffered the same fate.

Last year the US government imposed sanctions targeting the Indonesian military in response to violence in East Timor, but has since relaxed them. Defense Secretary Cohen raised the militia problem during his September visit to Jakaarta, and Clinton raised the issue during the UN Millennium Summit, but words alone have been ineffective.

Urge your senators to press the administration to take concrete action by reimposing the ban on commercial arms sales to the Indonesian military, until:

• the military and police have disarmed the militias and removed them from the camps
• independent investigations of the recent killings in Aceh and East Timor are carried out
• East Timorese in West Timor are given the opportunity to choose to return home free from intimidation

Remind your legislators that Indonesia's annual donor meeting in Tokyo in late October is an opportunity for the US to send a clear signal that continued inaction will be costly.

[Congressional switchboard: 202/224-3121]

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