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Poisoning human rights with impunity
Jokowi has disappointed those who believed he would help uncover Munir’s murder. He must stop pretending that the economy deserves higher priority than bringing to justice the masterminds of past atrocities.
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Protesters wear mask of the face of the late human rights defender Munir during the weekly Kamisan Silent protest in front of the Merdeka Palace in Jakarta on Sept. 7, 2017. (The Jakarta Post/Ibrahim Irsyad)
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bout 40,000 feet above Romania on Sept. 7, 2004, Indonesia’s leading human rights lawyer, Munir Said Thalib, was found dead in his seat aboard a Garuda Indonesia flight heading for Amsterdam.
The iconic human rights fighter, better known as Munir, had felt ill since the plane took off from Changi Airport in Singapore. He had complained to a flight attendant of diarrhea and a nagging stomach ache and received treatment from a cardiac surgeon who was on the same flight. An autopsy later determined the cause of Munir’s death was arsenic poisoning.
The murder case exposed serious flaws in Indonesia’s justice system. Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto, an off-duty Garuda pilot who met and talked to Munir in Singapore, was later convicted and sentenced to 14 years in prison. In fact he only served eight years of his sentence and regained his freedom late in November 2014.
A senior State Intelligence Agency (BIN) official accused of plotting the murder, Muchdi Purwoprandjono, was acquitted after a trial that was marked by intimidation against witnesses. After more than 13 years, the mastermind(s) behind the assassination have never been found.
The most puzzling part of the game is the killing took place six years after the authoritarian regime of former president Soeharto ended and sweeping reforms toward democracy began.
The fact that a persistent government critic like Munir was intentionally killed overseas, not at home, was perhaps a way for the alleged perpetrators to save the image of the fledgling democracy.
Imagine how the world would have reacted if Munir was murdered in his own country that was transforming into a democracy.
