So much for Indonesian armed forces chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto's promise that the military will refrain from any attempt at influencing this year's general elections.

Nearly 40 years after the bloody military-led purge of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), the Pamungkas regional command in the central Java city of Jogjakarta has sent a letter to the General Elections Commission with the names of 42 candidates for the provincial legislative council that it says are "environmentally unclean" – a euphemism for ties to the PKI.

The candidates are from 12 parties, including the former ruling Golkar party and President Megawati Sukarnoputri's Indonesian Democratic Party for Struggle. Most of those named are said to be relatives of former PKI members, an indication of the paranoia that still prevails in the army long after the communists have ceased to be a threat. Indeed, authorities have failed to uncover any evidence that the communists have sought to stage a revival since an estimated 500,000 people died in the orgy of violence against suspected communists that followed the overthrow of President Sukarno in 1965.