Jakarta – The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has asked the Navy to allow residents to continue using disputed land in Pasuran, East Java, while awaiting a permanent court ruling.
Komnas HAM chairman Abdul Hakim Garuda Nusantara said in a press conference Friday the villagers made their living from the land. "The Navy must give the villagers the chance to keep cultivating the land," Hakim said.
He also urged the government and the Navy to compensate the victims for the losses they and their families have suffered.
Four people were killed – including a pregnant woman – and eight were injured during a clash between marines and villagers over the disputed land, at the end of May in Alas Tlogo village, Pasuruan regency.
The marines claimed they opened fire because they felt their lives were being threatened by stone-throwing villagers, who were protesting the construction of a Navy office on 3,600 hectares of the disputed land. Thirteen marines have been named as suspects in the shootings.
Hakim said the incident violated human rights, although, he added, it could not be categorized as a gross rights violation.
Komnas HAM member Enny Soeprapto said it was irrelevant whether or not the marines opened fire in self-defense, as that was not the real issue. "What matters is... there were killings... and this is a violation of human rights," he said.
The killings also violated the 1945 Constitution, a 1999 law on human rights and the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Hakim said.
The commission also urged the Navy's internal affairs division to be objective and transparent in investigating the shooting. "We have handed over our findings to officials in the hope that law enforcement will be appropriately implemented."
Hakim said both the Navy and the government should work together to find a solution to the land dispute, without ignoring the rights of the villagers who have lived on and farmed the land for generations.
Airlangga University administrative law expert Raden Herlambang Perdana Wiratraman said land disputes between the military and civilians in East Java accounted for 25.72 percent of the 102 land conflicts in the province over the past 50 years.
The Alas Tlogo land dispute dates back several years, when residents from the subdistrict's 14 villages formally opposed plans by the Navy to use the land as a military training site. More than 1,045 families live on the land.
Vice President Jusuf Kalla said last month the military training center could not be moved to any other location, as East Java was one of the Navy's strongholds.