Bangkok – Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid said Friday that individual wrongdoers, not institution, must be punished in the crackdown against human rights violations by his country's military.

Speaking to members of human rights groups in Thailand, he said it was important to maintain respect for institutions such as the armed forces to maintain order. "The achievement of keeping law, keeping order, it's very important, but that's overlooked by everybody," said Wahid, who has come under increasing criticism, especially at home, for allowing his country's many urgent social, economic and political problems to drift.

Wahid was on a two-day official visit to Thailand, his fourth since he took the office last October. His remarks came as Indonesian and international human rights groups suggested that the Indonesian military was returning to the abuses it practiced during the rule of former President Suharto.

The military recently issued an arrest warrant for a human rights activist in the eastern province of Irian Jaya as part of wider crackdown on separatists there. Last week, what is suspected to be an Indonesian army death squad shot dead three human rights workers in Aceh on the island of Sumatra.

Wahid, in the context of suggesting that Western viewpoints may not be appropriate for tackling the problems of the developing world, pointed to the example of UN human rights commissioner Mary Robinson, who he said spoke of punishing the Indonesian armed forces for violations of human rights.

"Of course, in doing so, she loses sight [of the point] that we should respect the institution but punish the persons who abuse the rights of the institution," said Wahid. "It's not the armed forces of Indonesia who are at wrong, but individuals."

He said cases of human rights violations have to be pursued through the courts, "but we have to stick to respect because without that we will not have a strong institution." "To develop honesty doesn't mean we have to destroy what is existing," he said.

Last month Robinson, the UN's top human rights official, visited Indonesia and offered to help the government set up a special court to hear cases against suspects accused of atrocities in East Timor last year.

East Timor, annexed by Indonesia in 1976, in August last year voted overwhelmingly for independence. In the aftermath of the vote, militias backed by the Indonesian military ran riot, burning homes and forcing a large part of the population to cross into Indonesia West Timor. Order was restored only with the arrival of an international peacekeeping force.