Jakarta – Indonesia's army chief admitted Thursday that soldiers may have been involved in the murder of a Papua separatist leader and pledged action against any who were proven guilty.
"It is true that from the existing testimony there are indications towards that [army involvement] but it does not mean that it is certain," General Endriartono Sutarto said.
"The essence is that we have a high commitment to assist the resolution of this case. If there are any personnel involved, we will act against them," Sutarto was quoted by the Detikcom online news service as saying.
Top security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has said that several members of the armed forces (TNI) will sit on a national commission to probe the murder of Theys Hiyo Eluay in November. Yudhoyono said the inclusion of TNI representatives in the commission was decided "so that the investigation is not hindered, because there is a TNI unit being investigated in this case." Many people in Indonesia's easternmost province Papua, including its police chief, its governor and rights activists, have said there are indications that members of the Kopassus special army force had a role in the murder. Sutarto said the armed forces headquarters would send a military police team to help investigations but gave no details.
Activists in Papua, which was previously known as Irian Jaya, have called for an independent team to be set up to investigate the killing. After questioning at least seven Kopassus members local police admitted they had hit a dead end in their investigation. Earlier this month Home Affairs Minister Hari Sabarno promised that the military and police would not be represented on the commission.
Eluay was found murdered on November 11. He had been abducted the previous evening by an unidentified group as he drove home from a Heroes' Day celebration hosted by the Kopassus unit in Jayapura. Eluay's driver escaped and reported the abduction, which he said was carried out by non-Papuan people. He has since disappeared.
A sporadic low-level armed struggle for independence began after the Dutch ceded control of the territory to Indonesia in 1963. The province was renamed Papua this month under an autonomy law designed to lessen pressure for independence and which also gives it a much greater share of revenues from natural resources.