By James Balowski
On March 28, Andi Arief, the chairperson of Student Solidarity for Indonesian Democracy (SMID), was abducted at gunpoint from his brother's home in Lampung, South Sumatra. He has not been seen or heard from since.
Arief was taken into custody by men who neither identified themselves nor produced an arrest warrant. Despite efforts by Arief's parents to trace their son through human rights lawyers, no information has been forthcoming. Local police and military authorities have denied knowledge of his whereabouts.
A March 30 statement from Amnesty International said: "There is grave concern that he is at risk of torture or ill-treatment. He is also known to have been seriously ill recently and in view of this there is concern that he may require immediate medical assistance."
This is the latest is a spate of arrests and disappearances of pro-democracy activists. Since January, more than 300 people have been taken into custody in a climate of increased repression surrounding the special session of the People's Consultative Assembly. In March, the assembly reappointed Suharto as president for a seventh term. Large anti-Suharto protests occurred on campuses across Indonesia in the weeks before and following the appointment.
SMID is affiliated to the banned People's Democratic Party (PRD), which was accused of being behind the July 27 riots in 1996. Thirteen PRD members, including Budiman Sujatmiko and Dita Indah Sari, were sentenced to long jail terms for "subversion". Since then, Arief and other leaders of the PRD have been targets of an intensive hunt by the Indonesian military.
On March 13, three underground PRD leaders — Mugianto, Nesar Patria and Aan Rusdianto — were captured in Jakarta. According to a March 28 report by the Alliance of Independent Journalists, the activists were beaten and subjected to electric shock by the military in order to obtain information on the whereabouts of well-known PRD figures, including Arief.
Amnesty also asserts that many of those arrested over the last few months have been tortured and denied access to their families and human rights lawyers.
In February, 18 members of the People's Democratic Alliance (ALDERA) were arrested. They allege that they were badly beaten by police.
ALDERA's secretary general, Pius Lustrilanang, disappeared on February 4, and Desmond Mahesa from the Nusantara Legal Aid Institute disappeared on February 3. More than 100 people were arrested on February 10 during a demonstration organised by the Red and White Banner group outside the Bank of Indonesia.
During a large student demonstration at the University of Unila in Lampung, which began on March 18, 120 students were arrested (but later released), eight people suffered serious injuries, and 55 went "missing", two of whom are suspected to have been killed.
An armed forces spokesperson, Brigadier-General Mokodongan, was quoted in the March 31 Jakarta daily Kompas as saying that the armed forces cannot be held responsible for the kidnappings. "People should realise that the disappearances of these activists are nothing more than a scheme by certain people who want to show up ABRI [the armed forces] in a bad light", he said.
State-sponsored disappearances of political opponents on this scale have not occurred in Indonesia for years. Thousands disappeared and at least 1 million communists and left-wing sympathisers were massacred when Suharto seized power in 1965. Thousand more were interned without trial for long periods.
In 1993, more than 8000 people — most "petty criminals" — were disappeared by the military during a campaign known as "Petrus", or "mysterious killings". Although the military initially denied involvement, in his 1989 autobiography Suharto confirmed that he had personally authorised the killings, saying, "We needed to have our own treatment, firm measures" and that it was done "for the purpose of shock therapy".
A second but smaller wave of Petrus occurred in 1994, carried out by officers in uniform. The government claimed that the victims were shot while trying to escape from custody.