T

he International People’s Tribunal (IPT) on 1965 will move ahead with its fight for the rights of victims of the 1965 purge, despite the government’s dismissal of the tribunal’s recent report.

The warning was issued by human rights activists upon learning of the government’s rejection
of the issue, as indicated in comments made by a number of high-ranking government officials in recent days.

IPT coordinator Nursyahbani Katjasungkana said on Friday that the government would eventually have to respond to the Hague-based tribunal’s result because it would involve the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in the process.

After the IPT ruled on Wednesday that the systematic killing of people affiliated with the now defunct Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in 1965 constituted a crime against humanity, human rights activists involved in the tribunal began planning to present the outcome to the UNHRC during a universal periodic review slated for April next year.

The IPT will use the tribunal report as an alternative record to be read by all of the council’s commissioners.

The plan follows the government’s rejection of the report. The administration of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, who during the 2014 presidential election campaign promised to resolve cases of human rights violations, has insisted on not recognizing the report and has pushed people to refer only to the recommendations of the National 1965 Symposium issued in April.

If the IPT took the report to the council, Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Luhut Pandjaitan said he would in turn highlight the Westerling tragedy, a massacre in South Sulawesi during the Dutch colonial era.

“How can the government refuse to respond? [...] the council will raise questions about its responsibility and ask for clarification on what truly happened during 1965,” Nursyahbani said.

Since the government itself has yet to provide credible data regarding the mass killings, Nursyahbani said the expected result from next year’s review was an order for the state to reinvestigate the crimes against humanity.

It could be difficult for the government to deny the events any longer because orders from the UN are binding for all member states. Sanctions would cause political shame.

Next Monday, Nursyahbani will hand the tribunal report to the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), in the hope that the commission will push the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) to begin a judicial process.

Meanwhile, factions at the House of Representatives have backed the government’s rejection of the report, saying the government should not follow up and claiming the IPT is not an official institution.

“We have no business with that. We should not exaggerate this matter,” said House Speaker Ade Komarudin of the Golkar Party.

United Development Party (PPP) secretary Arsul Sani said the government did not need to bow to the IPT and added that moves by rights activists to take the case into the international arena would only embarrass the country, because they knew that the tribunal result could not be implemented.

“We remind the human rights activists who are involved in the IPT that their way of making the PKI case international is really unwise and morally unjustified,” Arsul said.

Meanwhile, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) has slammed the government for being too slow to provide data and evidence about the 1965 massacre.

“Although the government has no obligation to follow up on the tribunal’s ruling, it could at least make a recommendation. If it says the IPT has no valid data, does it have [valid data]? I suggest the government not just talk. It should reveal data immediately,” PDI-P lawmaker Masinton Pasaribu said.

He said Indonesia could in fact resolve the case without international intervention, adding that the IPT would not need to take the case to the UNHRC if the government was more active and worked more quickly to resolve it.
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