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Rights groups criticize Indonesia's criminal proceedings
(tribunnews
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(tribunnews.com) (tribunnews.com)
(tribunnews.com)
Death penalty convicts in Indonesia were frequently not given access to lawyers and were forced to confess after being severely beaten, says Amnesty International in its report released in Jakarta on Thursday.
The report says that during the investigation, prosecutors often used violence to force the suspects to admit to their crimes and did not perform a professional investigation instead.
The Amnesty International's report is similar to the results of a study conducted by local civil society groups, such as the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) and the Institute for Criminal Justice Reform (ICJR).
ICJR executive director Supriyadi said Amnesty's report strengthened its institutional findings in 2014 that unveiled flaws in Indonesia's criminal proceedings.
Meanwhile, head of Kontras' civil and political rights division Putri Kanesia, who assisted death penalty convicts, said that the government should have understood whether they implemented the right criminal proceedings for death penalty convicts. "Our goal is to enforce law, not to force it," Putri said.
"What can be done now is to force the implementation of the moratorium for the death penalty and to review the death penalty executions that had been implemented in the past," Putri added.
Amnesty International campaign director for Southeast Asia Josef Benedict expressed his disappointment with the bad record of President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo.
"Jokowi went to the Palace on the back of human rights promises. [Therefore, this is] hugely regressive," Josef said, referring to the executions of 14 convicts this year, 12 of them being foreign citizens. (bbn)(++++)
