Appeals over acquitted East Timor suspects to be filed next month, court says
Mon Mar 17, 4:15 AM ET
JAKARTA, Indonesia - Prosecutors plan to soon appeal a string of verdicts
acquitting Indonesian police and military officers accused over the
violence that swept East Timor (news - web sites) during its break from
Indonesia in 1999, a court spokesman said Monday.
Critics say the acquittals by a human rights court in Jakarta of six
military officers, three policemen and two former East Timor government
servants on charges of crimes against humanity show that Indonesia is
not
serious about seeking justice.
The 11 are among 18 officials on trial over a campaign of terror by
Indonesian troops and their militia proxies aimed at forcing people to
vote
for continued union with Jakarta. Nearly 2,000 civilians were believed
killed.
Only five defendants have been convicted of prison terms ranging from
three
to 10 years. They all remain free pending appeals of their cases. The
trials of two military generals are ongoing.
"All the prosecutors dealing with those acquitted have submitted
their
appeals to the court," said Judge Andi Samsan Nganro, a spokesman
for the
Jakarta court.
"We are in the process of finalizing the dossiers, and hopefully
we can
file the appeals to the Supreme Court in April," he told The Associated
Press.
Earlier Monday, Supreme Court chief Bagir Manan installed six judges
to try
the appeals.
Human rights activists have criticized the trials as a sham, saying they
were convened in order to defuse an international drive to set up a U.N.
war crimes trial for East Timor akin to those for ex-Yugoslavia and Rwanda.
In a sign of growing frustration with the legal process in Indonesia,
East
Timorese prosecutors indicted last month several senior generals, including
then military chief Gen. Wiranto, over the violence. Jakarta said it would
ignore that indictment.
East Timor gained full independence in May, after a period of transitional
rule by the United Nations (news - web sites) following Indonesia's brutal
24-year occupation.