The Solidarity Action Committee for Munir (KASUM) has urged president-elect Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo, once he assumes office, to instruct the Attorney General'€™s Office (AGO) to challenge the controversial acquittal of former National Intelligence Agency (BIN) deputy chief Muchdi Purwopranjono, who was once charged with masterminding the murder of prominent human rights campaigner Munir Said Thalib.

The group made the demand during a meeting with one of Jokowi'€™s transition team deputies, Andi Widjajanto.

'€œPak Jokowi must offer political support to the AGO to file a case review of Muchdi'€™s acquittal, as [new evidence] connecting him [Muchdi] to the murder exists,'€ KASUM'€™s Choirul Anam said after a one-hour closed-door meeting with Andi.

Choirul said that the evidence included recordings of telephone conversations between Muchdi and a former pilot of flag carrier Garuda Indonesia, Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto, that had been kept by the National Police. '€œThe AGO has acknowledged the existence of the recordings, but their whereabouts remain unknown,'€ said.

Polycarpus was sentenced to 20 years in prison for putting arsenic in Munir'€™s tea at a Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf outlet at Singapore'€™s Changi Airport, where Munir was transiting en route to Amsterdam in September 2004.

Last year, the Supreme Court reduced Pollycarpus'€™ sentence to 14 years.

While Pollycarpus was sentenced for his role in the murder, Muchdi was acquitted by the South Jakarta District Court in 2009 due to a lack of evidence and also because key witnesses who had initially made statements against him recanted their accounts.

The link between Muchdi and Pollycarpus was revealed following evidence presented at Muchdi'€™s trial, showing that the two men had made more than 40 calls to each other. Some of the calls were made on a private number, while the remainder were made from BIN telephone numbers.

The relationship between the two men was further revealed by statements made by former BIN agents, who later retracted, saying that the statements had been given under duress.

A government-sanctioned fact-finding team also reported the Muchdi-Pollycarpus telephone conversations, highlighting that Pollycarpus had on several occasions rung a BIN telephone number, using direct inward dialling (DID), which could only be accessed with the permission of the owner, Muchdi.

The team'€™s report further alleged that former BIN chief AM Hendropriyono was also responsible for the murder due to the '€œcompartment'€ system used within the institution, which gave free rein to any deputy leading a division within the institution to conduct operations and to recruit members without answering to anyone other than the chief.

Hendropriyono, who is an advisor to Jokowi'€™s transition team, has repeatedly denied the allegation.

Andi, one of the transition team'€™s deputies who also oversees human rights issues, said he would brief Jokowi on KASUM'€™s demands.

Separately, presidential spokesman Teuku Faizasyah said that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had instructed the reopening of the investigation into Munir'€™s murder.

'€œEfforts to solve the case were taken during President SBY'€™s administration, but we don'€™t know whether everything will be completed [before Yudhoyono leaves office] or not. But I have received information that an instruction has been issued to reopen the investigation into the murder of Munir,'€ Teuku told reporters at the State Palace on Tuesday.

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