Jakarta – The publishers of the magazine Suara Independen admitted that they felt that the magazine had a "harsh" tone and because of this they made a statement that the contents of the magazine was not the responsibility of the publishers.

This was revealed by witnesses in the Suara Independen trial on February 18 at the South Jakarta State Court: the owners of the publishing company Zaiyan Putra, Jasrul Zen, along with staff Zainuddin (production), Janimart (printing), Roni (paper cutter) and Indra Mulyadi. On trial are Andi Syahputra (31) who placed the printing order who was accompanied by a defense team including Irianto Subiakto, Esther Yusuf, and Ori Rachmanfrom the Jakarta Legal Aid Foundation (Lembaga Bantuan Hukum Jakarta).

According to Jasrul Zen, this was the first time they received a print order for Suara Independen from the accused. The order was for 1.3 million Rupiah to print 5,000 copies. Jasrul said that he had received an order from the producer, Zainuddin that there were a number of titles which were rather harsh [keras, ie critical of the regime-JB] so they wrote up the statement when the accused paid them 800,000 Rupiah for the job.

Some of the items which was considered "keras" included articles titled "Boss Cockroach", "Generals killed...". The witness said they did not cancel the order because they did not read the [full] contents. Only 3,000 copies were printed before the printing house was raided by police.

[Abridged translation from Kompas - JB]