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Munir case 'can push intelligence reform'
Reform within intelligence agencies is necessary to make those bodies accountable and prevent arbitrary killings such as the murder of rights activist Munir, lawmakers and experts said Tuesday
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eform within intelligence agencies is necessary to make those bodies accountable and prevent arbitrary killings such as the murder of rights activist Munir, lawmakers and experts said Tuesday.
"We need to push for intelligence reform that will allow for a control mechanism over the intelligence bodies so that they don't use state money to harm people," Golkar politician Yuddy Chrisnandi told a seminar here Tuesday.
Yuddy and several other lawmakers as well as local and international experts attending the seminar, which was jointly held by German-based Friedrich Ebert Stiftung and Geneva-based Centre for Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF), agreed Munir's assassination could trigger reform in the intelligence community.
"The Munir murder opens a political space for intelligence reform in Indonesia. The public has argued it can't have agencies that kill people," said Peter Gill, a professor in intelligence studies at the University of Salford.
Munir Said Thalib died from arsenic poisoning in 2004 on board a Garuda flight from Jakarta to Amsterdam. Overturning its own verdict, the Supreme Court convicted former Garuda Indonesia pilot Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto of the premeditated murder of Munir and sentenced him to 20 years in prison.
Former deputy National Intelligence Agency (BIN) chief Muchdi Purwo Prandjono and the agency's current second man in command M. As'ad are alleged to have played a part in the murder. No formal investigation has been launched against them, despite their links to the case being mentioned in earlier court trials.
BIN leaders have denied the allegations.
Mutammimul 'Ula of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) said the party was committed to pushing intelligence reform by endorsing a bill that puts the intelligence bodies under the control of the House of Representatives.
BIN currently falls under the president's auspices.
"We agree the future law on intelligence opens the possibility for scrutinizing and overseeing the intelligence bodies," Mutammimul said.
Chairman of the House's Commission I for defense, security and international affairs Theo Sambuaga insisted the government submit the bill on intelligence as soon as possible.
"We've run out of time. Unless the draft reaches us soon, we can't get it passed before the 2009 election," he said.
Gill said the current draft law proposed by the government was too general and justified the current practices and authority of the intelligence agencies.
"It really just describes what they can do, and now it's legal," he said.
Gill proposed the intelligence law limit the authority of the intelligence bodies, and specify in what areas they could operate as well as which institution should supervise them.
In addition, he said, the law must specify the role of the parliament in controlling the agencies.
He also suggested combined deliberation of the bills on intelligence bodies, state secrecy and freedom of information to determine the extent of the intelligence bodies' authority.
