AGE
Prosecutor demands court clears general
June 6 2003
By Telly Nathalia
Jakarta
An Indonesian
prosecutor yesterday demanded a court acquit a top general on
trial over violence in East Timor in 1999, saying it had not been proved
that he was guilty of committing crimes against humanity.
Prosecutors
had been expected to announce their sentencing demands for
Major-General Adam Damiri yesterday.
But in a
surprise move, and insisting he had not been pressured, prosecutor
S. Hozie asked the court to rule "the defendant had not been proven
guilty
of crimes against humanity" in East Timor when it voted to break
from
Jakarta's rule.
The chief
judge said the court would reconvene on July 1 to hear a
statement from General Damiri before passing judgement.
Mr Hozie
later said the demand did not mean prosecutors had dropped the
charges against General Damiri, the regional military chief with
responsibility for East Timor during its independence vote in August,
1999.
He did not
explain the difference between that and demanding General Damiri
be declared not guilty.
General
Damiri is the last of 18 suspects on trial over the violence. The
majority have been acquitted, drawing harsh criticism from international
and local human rights groups.
When he
went on trial last July, prosecutors told the special human rights
court he was guilty of crimes against humanity for not taking proper action
to prevent violence.
East Timor
was left in ruins after the UN-organised ballot triggered a
killing rampage and wave of destruction by militias backed by the
Indonesian military.
The United
Nations, which ran East Timor after the vote until formal
independence, estimates more than 1000 people were killed. General Damiri
has denied any involvement.
Wearing
military battledress and with a number of regular troops and
special forces soldiers in the court, General Damiri wept when Mr Hozie
said he should be declared not guilty.
Referring
to one incident, an attack on the home of East Timorese bishop
and Nobel Peace laureate Carlos Belo, Mr Hozie said there had been no
military involvement.
The court
hearing should have been held weeks ago but had been snubbed a
number of times by General Damiri.
The human
rights court - set up to hear cases over the East Timor violence
in the wake of international pressure on Jakarta - has convicted two
civilians, both of them East Timorese, and three security officers. All
are
free pending appeal.
The trial
is the latest test of the judiciary's independence in a country
where the military wields considerable clout.
Rights groups
say other elements of the trial process are farcical,
including the failure to try General Wiranto, Indonesia's military
commander at the time of the violence.
. Days before
East Timorese Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri will pay his first
official visit to Jakarta, prosecutors in Dili yesterday announced they
would try an Indonesian national for crimes against humanity.
Beni Ludji,
deputy commander of the Aitarak militia group, will be the
first Indonesian to face trial in East Timor before a special UN-backed
court judging war crimes committed during the 1999 referendum.
He was formally
charged with the murder of independence campaigner Guido
Alves Correia as a crime against humanity. Correia was hacked to death
in
September 1999.
- Reuters, Jill Jolliffe
This story
was found at:
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/06/05/1054700335049.html
Adam Damiri: A soldier's record
June 6 2003
Major-General
Adam Damiri was commander of the Bali-based military area,
which included East Timor.
- He is
believed to have co-ordinated Operation Clean Sweep in January 1999
aimed at killing pro-independence activists.
- It is
likely that General Damiri was central to training, funding and
arming anti-independence militias.
- He held
many meetings with militia leaders, clandestinely and openly, in
East Timor and Bali throughout 1999. He described the militias as
"patriotic organisations".
- Militia
leader Eurico Guterres boasted to journalists that he took his
orders directly from General Damiri.
- On April
17, 1999, he was present at a militia rally in Dili at which
Guterres urged his followers to "capture and kill" independence
supporters
- 12 were subsequently murdered.
- On July
1, 2002, General Damiri was indicted for crimes against humanity
in relation to massacres in Liquica, the Dili homes of Isaac Leandros
and
Manuel Carrascalaos, the Dili Catholic diocese office, Bishop Carlos
Belos's residence and the Suai church.
- In February
this year he was charged in absentia with crimes against
humanity before the Dili special panel.
- In December
1999, General Damiri was promoted to operational assistant to
the armed forces chief of staff in Jakarta. He was responsible for troop
movements to Aceh.
- He is
currently serving in Aceh, where the army has launched a renewed
campaign to crush the independence movement.
Source: Masters of Terror: Indonesia's Military and Violence in East Timor
in 1999 (Australian National University, Canberra, 2002)