The alleged torture of six Christians in Maluku at the hands of Indonesia's counter-terrorist police unit, Detachment 88, has thrown a spotlight on Australia's multi-million dollar support for its work.
Detachment 88 began as a small, elite squad, in a bid to insulate it from the corruption and poor practices that plague Indonesia's security forces. But it's grown in size and reach, amid mounting complaints about the use of excessive force and breaches of human rights. Australia's new Foreign minister Kevin Rudd is likely to meet soon with his Indonesian counterpart Marty Natalegawa, with one Australian expert accusing Canberra of turning a blind eye to Detachment 88's breaches.
Presenter: Linda Mottram
Speakers: Dr Greg Fealy, Australian National University; Dr Marcus Meitzner, Australian National University
Mottram: Created in 2004, in the wake of the Bali bombings, Detachment 88 began as a small, elite group within the Indonesian police with a strictly counter-terrorism brief. Australia was hoping for an effective unit based on its small numbers, its high level of training and good pay rates. Doctor Greg Fealy, an expert in Indonesia and Islam at the Australian National University, says Detachment 88 or Densus has been one of the most important and successful Indonesian police units.
Fealy: It's arrested more than 300 people on terrorism charges and its been able to get the great majority of those convicted. So its done its job very well, its very well trained and if Densus wasn't there, you would have to create some other kind of unit doing a similar task because this is very specialised work.
Mottram: But the record has been sullied. For one thing, instead of capturing and extracting intelligence from terror suspects, enabling authorities to fill in critical knowledge gaps, Detachment 88 has recently more often killed them. That's also fuel for jihadists seeking new recruits, experts fear.
The elite nature of Densus has also been eroded, as its grown and fanned out across all 33 of Indonesia's provinces to respond to terror cells in diverse parts of the archipelago from central Sulawesi, to Maluku, to Aceh.
Lecturer in Indonesian Studies at the Australian National university Doctor Marcus Mietzner is acknowledged by colleagues as the best informed in Australia about Indonesia's security apparatus.
Mietzner: Detachment 88 is no longer a small, unique, elite unit. It has been expanded, it is now basically present at all important local levels, including in Maluku where this incident happened. So it is no longer under the strict control of police headquarters where you could again insulate this particular unit from tendencies in other police units. So the expansion, and in a sense as you will the decentralisation of Detachment 88 has made it impossible to maintain that very high standard which was certainly in place at the beginning.
Mottram: And that means it has also strayed into enforcing Indonesia's laws that make expressions of separatism – from flag waving to writing an essay – a crime that's seen many jailed for long terms. Greg Fealy says the Fairfax newspapers report on the cases in Maluku by reporter Tom Allard are likely a case of how Detachment 88 or Densus has been derailed.
Fealy: This is a much more politically charged area, these kind of separatist group areas and I think there are other sections of the national police that can deal quite effectively with that. You just risk the possibility that things like what Tom Allard has said happened in Ambon could be happening elsewhere in places like Papua and Aceh and the like.
Mottram: Doctor Fealy says a recent positive development was the announcement that all Densus units would be responsible to the national police commander.
Fealy: So they're now bypassing the provincial police chiefs and that centralisation should result, I hope in better oversight and in better professional standards at the local level.
Mottram: It comes on the back of continuing complaints about Detachment 88's harsh and brutal treatment of suspects... though its not a debate that's seen much light in Australia. Marcus Mietzner again.
Mietzner: There was always torture of suspects, of people who were in detention but again especially in Australia no-body really cared because it was seen as a necessary evil to get to the problem of Islamic militancy. The reason why this is now raising a different response is simply that these are Christian separatists and not Islamic militants.
Mottram: Doctor Mietzner says Australia needs to think carefully about what it wants from it's support for Indonesia's counter-terrorism efforts.
Mietzner: If the focus remains on effective counter-terrorism measures then the assistance certainly should be continued. If however the stress is on upholding human rights and making sure that everything is according to procedure, then of course the strategy would have to be changed.
Mottram: Its another issue for the complex Australia-Indonesia agenda, when Kevin Rudd sits down soon in his new capacity as Australia's foreign minister with his Indonesian counterpart, Marty Natalagawa.