Indonesia's democracy tested by activist's death
JAKARTA, Tuesday (Reuters) An Indonesian murder mystery set in the
skies and involving spies, arsenic poisoning and the national airline is
becoming a dramatic test of democracy in the world's most populous
Muslim nation.
A few years ago, under the rule of iron-fisted former president
Suharto, authorities would likely have clamped down on news of the
killing of Munir Said Thalib, 38, a democracy activist who died aboard a
flight to Amsterdam last September.
The motive for his death remains cloaked in mystery, but the events
surrounding it are slowly becoming clearer following a probe ordered by
Indonesia's new government. An autopsy by Dutch police revealed arsenic
poisoning, and the Indonesian probe implicated employees of national
airline Garuda and officials of the state intelligence agency (BIN),
although its former chief strongly denies involvement.
The saga serves as an illustration of how much has changed in
Indonesia, but also how reforms still have some way to go.
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, a former general who became the country's
first directly elected president last October, appointed a commission
made up of leading human rights activists and former police officials to
probe Munir's death.
In June, that team presented him with a report implicating top
intelligence officials, say members of the team who wrote it.
"They are high ranking officials," commission member Usman Hamid, a
member of the Kontras human rights group formerly headed by Munir, told
Reuters. Earlier, three Garuda employees were arrested after a police
investigation.
Although no action has yet been taken on any intelligence officials
following the commission's report, and details are not yet known of who
it names and how it links them to the case, one top official has gone
public to deny any connection.
"Frankly and honestly, I had nothing to do with Munir's death. I
never asked anyone to kill him," Hendropriyono, the former chief of the
powerful national intelligence agency BIN, said in a half-page interview
in the Jakarta Post last week.
Hendropriyono, a close ally of Yudhoyono's predecessor Megawati
Sukarnoputri, retired from BIN late last year after Yudhoyono defeated
Megawati in a run-off election. The public comments from commission
members and Hendropriyono would have been near unthinkable in the
Suharto era, when for members of Indonesia's elite "face", or pride, was
paramount and public accountability and open debate a rare commodity.
"Five years ago it never would have even been possible to insinuate
that the head of BIN might be involved," said Sidney Jones, an Indonesia
expert at the International Crisis Group.
"It says a lot about how far Indonesia has come that an independent
team has been able to work, granted under severe restraints, but in a
way that has allowed its findings to reach the public in a pretty
unadorned fashion."
Although it is not legally binding, the commission's report
recommends the police further investigate top BIN officials and others
for alleged involvement in a conspiracy to kill Munir.
Whether times have changed enough for things to go much further
remains to be seen. |