TAPOL and ETAN Letter to UK and US
Ambassadors to UN on Anniversary of 30
September Movement
HE Dame
Barbara Woodward,
Permanent
Representative
United Kingdom Mission to
the UN
New York, NY
and
HE Kelly Craft
Permanent Representative
United States Mission to the UN
New
York, NY
30 September 2020
Dear Ambassadors,
We write to you on
the fifty-fifth anniversary of the so-called
September 30th movement (G30S) in
Indonesia. The movement, which led to the
mass killing of hundreds of thousands of
people accused of being communists by the
military and its proxies, marked the
beginning of the New Order military
dictatorship in Indonesia. The governments
of the United States and the United Kingdom
both played crucial roles in these events.
Despite a period of political reform
after 1998 following the fall of the
dictatorship, there has not been an
accounting for the deaths of those killed
during 1965 and in the years that followed,
nor proper acknowledgement by the
authorities of the many human rights
violations committed during 32 years of rule
under military dictatorship. Without
acknowledgement and a process of
truth-seeking, there can be no
reconciliation and closure, no justice for
the many victims and their loved ones, and
no genuine commitment to upholding democracy
in Indonesia.
The
Indonesian military may have formally
withdrawn from the frontline of politics,
but it still enjoys considerable power and
influence, which has been enhanced under the
presidency of Joko Widodo. The former
military officers he has appointed to
cabinet have influenced a policy of allowing
the security forces to enforce social
distancing and mask wearing during the
Covid-19 pandemic. The executive and
legislature have failed to compel the
military to divest from its businesses as
required by a 2004 law, and the legislature
is even debating whether to appoint serving
military officers to the civilian
bureaucracy, a proposal of President Widodo.
The military has been involved in the
conflict in West Papua, which has been
ongoing since 1965, during which it has been
responsible for numerous documented and
undocumented human rights violations. Tens
of thousands have died and the territory's
population continues to suffer from joint
military and police operations. Most
recently, it was reported that Pastor
Yeremia Zanambani killed by the Indonesian
military near his church.
During
President Widodo's address to the UN's
General Assembly of 22 September, he claimed
that Indonesia shared a responsibility to
strengthen the United Nations and
multilateralism. On 15 September,
Indonesia's UN representative Dian Triansyah
Djani,
speaking in the Security Council,
highlighted Indonesia's role in peacekeeping
training and promoted the greater
participation of women soldiers in UN
Peacekeeping Operations, citing his own
country as an example. However, there is a
danger that the serious problems associated
with the military, particularly the stalled
process of security sector reform,
longstanding impunity, and enduring military
power and influence over domestic politics,
will be overlooked.
We therefore
draw your attention to the clear
contradiction between promoting the values
of the United Nations in respect of human
rights, democracy, and multilateralism and
the deployment of peacekeeping personnel
from a nation with an unreformed military
where the president is relying on a cabal of
former military officers to govern and
continues to shut out proper scrutiny of
past and ongoing atrocities in West Papua
and elsewhere.
In your capacity
as representatives of permanent members of
the Security Council, we call on you and
your governments to investigate and raise
with the Indonesian government these
problems. The United States and the United
Kingdom have a duty to address the impunity
and influence that the military continues to
enjoy.
Both your countries have
a responsibility to correct the damaging
history of aiding military abuses when your
countries regarded the dictatorship as a
close ally and provided it with substantial
security assistance and diplomatic support.
In 1975, for example, when Indonesia was
also on the UN Security Council, your
governments supported Indonesia as it
invaded East Timor. Both of your countries
sold arms to Indonesia and trained its
military personnel even though it was clear
that they were committing atrocities in East
Timor, Aceh and West Papua, and in Indonesia
more generally.
Yours sincerely,
Pelagio Doutel, Campaigner
TAPOL
info@tapol.org
John
M Miller, Coordinator
East Timor and
Indonesia Action Network (ETAN)
etan@etan.org
cc: Permanent Mission
of the Republic of Indonesia to the United
Nations
