ALSO

Violations in Maluku

Asian Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Network has been receiving consistent reports of serious human rights violations including involuntary disappearances and torture of indigenous AlifUrus in Maluku , Indonesia .

In January 2007, an activist identified as Harun Haikutty (32) of Waraloin village in Ceram in Maluku was murdered allegedly by the Indonesian company “Pt Abde Guna Bahari” owned by the country’s Vice President Jusuf Kalla. The deceased was at the forefront in the protest against the illegally logging of tropical hardwoods around Waraloin village by the company.

As the protest against the logging company grew louder, Harud had suddenly disappeared. Later, his mutilated body was recovered at the location of the Pt Abde Guna Bahari company in January 2007. The dead body bore marks of stabbing and his head was severed with a chain saw. But the police failed to take any action against the company or to investigate the killing. When the family members and the villagers demanded an inquiry into the murder of Harud, the logging company threatened them with dire consequences if they did not remain silent. In protest, the family of the deceased took some chain saws and other equipments of the logging company but these equipments were forcibly recovered by the company with the help of the Indonesian police and military.

There have also ben reports of arbitrary arrest and denial of fair trial.   On 28 June 2007, 25 Moluccans were arrested for performing the “Tjakalele”, a traditional war dance carrying the National Flag of the Republik Maluku Selatan (Republic of the South Moluccas , RMS) before the President of Indonesia, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the international delegates as a show of peaceful protest during a function in Maluku. The Indonesian President was there to officially launch the Indonesian National Family Planning programme. Apart from their aspirations for independence, the Maluku people were also against the Indonesian National Family Planning programme (which restricted the number of children of a couple to two) because they felt that it was unnecessarily imposed on them as Maluku was not so overpopulated like the island of Java and saw it as a measure of suppression.

The police and the military immediately used force to arrest the 25 Moluccans for their peaceful protest and sent to prison. They were charged with being the members of the Republik Maluku Selatan (Republic of the South Moluccas , RMS).

AITPN is presently in possession of a list of 45 Maluccans, aged between 20 and 67, who have been arrested and sent to jail for peaceful show of dissent.

They have been allegedly tortured brutally in custody. But no independent human rights or humanitarian organization has been provided access to them in detention.

They were deprived of fair trial. Since their arrest, the prisoners were not allowed access to anybody including their lawyers and family members. Yet, the court convicted them. Six of them were given death penalty, some others life imprisonment and the rest at least 17 years of imprisonment.

On 13 October 2007 between 2.30 and 4.30 am, the Indonesian police and military arrested five AlifUrus indigenous peoples identified as Novi Adolph (32), Isak Saimima (31), Ferdinan Noya (33), Yohanis Siplolo (45) and Deni de Fretes (45) from their homes on the charges of being the members of the Republik Maluku Selatan (Republic of the South Moluccas, RMS). About 35 members of the Indonesian police and the military raided their homes in the island of Ceram but found nothing to prove their involvement with the RMS. Yet they were arrested. Similarly, on 27 October 2007 at around 4 pm, Dominggus Salamena (44) was arrested by the police and the military on the charges of being involved with the RMS.

The six AlifUrus have been imprisoned without any trial.

The situation in Malukus calls for immediaton intervention of the Indonesian human rights organisations as well as the international human rights community.