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Release of Freddy's statement not intended to defame, Kontras says
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Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) coordinator Haris Azhar speaks at a press conference last year. (Kompas.com/Abba Gabbrilin)
T
he Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) has said it regretted the reporting of its coordinator Haris Azhar to the police for defamation, claiming there was no such intention behind its publication of the controversial statements of recently executed drug kingpin Freddy Budiman.
The human rights watchdog said its goal was to push for a probe into the three institutions mentioned in the story Haris wrote based on the statement of the infamous drug kingpin, who was executed on Friday.
The institutions – the National Police, Indonesian Military (TNI) and National Narcotics Agency (BNN) – all separately reported Haris to the National Police's Criminal Investigation Department (Bareskrim) for alleged defamation on Tuesday.
"We had no intention to defame the Police, TNI and BNN. Our intention when exposing the conversation between Haris and Freddy was to support reform in the three institutions," the deputy coordinator of Kontras’ advocacy division, Yati Andriani, said as reported by kompas.com on Wednesday.
The report against Haris was made after he released his written record of Freddy’s statement, in which the latter said he ran his business with the involvement of top officials. Although the meeting in which he heard the statement took place in mid 2014, Haris only posted the story on his social media accounts on Thursday evening last week, just hours before a firing squad killed Freddy on Nusakambangan prison island.
Kontras does not consider the conversation to be legally admissible, Yati said, adding that rather than reporting him, the three institutions should have treated Haris’ writing as a legitimate report to be followed up on. She acknowledged there was no recording of the conversation as prison authorities barred visitors from taking electronic devices into the prison.
Therefore, Yati urged authorities to check the recording from the Closed Circuit Television camera in the high-security prison to ascertain that the meeting and conversation actually took place.
Another Kontras member Satrio Wirataru agreed that the three institutions should have followed up on the reports in Haris’ statement before reporting him for defamation. He added that Haris had been accompanied by the Nusakambangan prison warden and two religious clerics when he met with Freddy.
In the post that went viral last week, Haris wrote that Freddy had told him he would contact officers at the police, BNN and customs when smuggling drugs from China. Allegedly, members at each of the institutions would set a price for security services to allow Freddy’s drugs to safely enter Indonesia. (rin)
