Andrew Burrell, Jakarta – A senior Indonesian military officer convicted yesterday over the bloodshed in East Timor in 1999 will remain free, despite being sentenced to five years jail for failing to prevent attacks against civilians in the former Indonesian province.
Brigadier-General Noer Muis, who was Indonesia's last military governor in East Timor, is the highest ranking Indonesian officer to be convicted by the Human Rights Court in Jakarta. He rejected the decision and said he would appeal.
Under the Indonesian legal system, a defendant found guilty and sentenced to a prison term can be permitted by the court to remain free, pending an often lengthy appeals process.
Muis is the fifth person to be sentenced to a jail term by the court, which has been accused of delivering soft verdicts and erroneous acquittals.
A total of 18 Indonesian officials and militia members have been tried over the violence that erupted before and after the independence referendum in East Timor in August 1999.
An East Timor human rights activist, Hendardi, last night rejected the Muis verdict as too soft, and said the court's credibility had been damaged from the beginning.
"Because it didn't include [former Indonesian military chief] Wiranto and other big fish as suspects, we must question the credibility of the tribunal," said Mr Hendardi, the chairman of the Indonesian Legal Aid Association.
Muis was accused of allowing pro-Indonesian militias into the town of Suai to attack a church in which 27 people died in September, 1999.
He was also accused of allowing militias and police officers to invade the home of Catholic Bishop Carlos Belo. At least 15 people died in that attack.
Last month, Muis was among those charged with crimes against humanity in separate proceedings in East Timor.
Yesterday's sentence is the harshest handed down since November, when Eurico Guterres, the notorious former militia commander, was sentenced to 10 years jail for inciting a massacre at the Dili home of an independence leader.
Meanwhile, former Indonesian president B.J. Habibie, who authorised the United Nations to hold the independence ballot, will be the star witness at the trial of Muis's predecessor, Tono Suratman, at the Human Rights Court next week.
Dr Habibie has returned to Indonesia from his base in Germany to attend a meeting of former world leaders, including former Australian prime minister Malcolm Fraser.