A. Junaidi, Jakarta – Observers warned the nation on Thursday that press freedom was back under threat, despite the downfall of authoritarian president Soeharto six years ago.

The media has come increasingly under threat with state officials and businesspeople lodging criminal and civil charges against media enterprises without taking the Press Law into account.

Former chairman of the Press Council Atmakusumah Astraatmadja said charges against journalists of Rakyat Merdeka newspaper and Tempo magazine and a court verdict against Koran Tempo daily constituted intimidation and undermined press freedom.

"All that forces journalists into self-censorship. The media can no longer dare to speak out for public interests," he told a seminar titled: Press Freedom under Threat.

Atmakusumah blamed the government for failing to protect journalists covering the war against separatist rebels in the troubled province of Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam.

A senior RCTI reporter, Ersa Siregar, was killed last December by soldiers in a gunfight with Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebels who abducted him in June last year. His cameraman, Fery Santoro who was also taken hostage along with him, has not been released.

Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University Rector Azyumardi Azra concurred, saying that if this trend continued it could endanger press freedom. "The Tempo case is a shock. It has threatened press freedom," he told the same seminar.

Last month, the South Jakarta District Court ruled against Koran Tempo and ordered it to pay a US$1 million fine to businessman Tomy Winata who brought a libel case against the newspaper.

In December, the same court ordered Koran Tempo to publicly apologize to the owner of the ailing Texmaco group, Marimutu Sinivasan, who filed a libel suit over a series of critical articles on his business empire carried by the newspaper.

The same court had also sentenced journalists of Rakyat Merdeka to several months in prison for articles considered defamatory against President Megawati Soekarnoputri and House of Representatives Speaker Akbar Tandjung.

Similarly, senior lawyer Nono Anwar Makarim lashed out at state officials and businesspeople for taking the media to court by brushing aside the Press Law.

They should use the Press Law in handling their disputes with the media instead of criminalizing the press cases by directly bringing journalists or their companies to court, he said.

Nono argued that courts could impose unlimited fines on media enterprises or journalists charged both under the Criminal Code (KUHP) and the Criminal Code Procedures (KUHAP).

"Huge fines could kill media companies, and later press freedom. Fines should not lead to the bankruptcy of the media industry" he added.

But based on the Press Law, print or electronic media can be fined a maximum of Rp 500 million (US$58,823) should they refuse to publish apologies and objections of readers.

Meanwhile, Tomy Winata's lawyer Desmond J. Mahesa urged the public not to question the amount of the fine, but instead the substance of the Koran Tempo case, in which an article linked his client with last year's massive fire in the Tanah Abang market, Central Jakarta.

"Tempo should have provided the facts if there was any such proposal from Tomy to rebuild the market," Desmond told Thursday's seminar.

He said he refused to use the Press Law, claiming that it did not regulate defamation cases as stipulated in the Criminal Code.

Desmond said his client also rejected his right of reply over what he considered to be Tempo's defamatory articles, as recommended by the Press Law.

The lawyer said Tomy also refused to involve the Press Council in a mediation to settle the case because it clearly favored the newspaper.

"Since the beginning, Pak Atmakusumah commented that Tempo's report was in keeping with journalistic code of ethics. How can we trust such a partial press council," he said.