Tony Hotland, Jakarta – The end of the Truth and Reconciliation (KKR) law raises further questions about the government's commitment to the human rights section of the Aceh peace agreement signed in Helsinki last year.
Vice President Jusuf Kalla, presidential spokesman Andi Mallarangeng and Constitutional Court justice Jimly Asshidiqie had no answers when they were asked about the issue on Friday.
Both Kalla and Andi said that the government would have to review the verdict first and seek the opinion of the House of Representatives. Jimly was even vaguer in his response to the question.
"No, the one in Aceh is different. That has nothing to do with the KKR law. But if it does, well, I suppose the government will do something about that," he said.
The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) states that a commission for truth and reconciliation will be established for Aceh by the Indonesian Commission of Truth and Reconciliation with the task of formulating and determining reconciliation measures.
Jimly said one of the reasons the court annulled the law was due to the inactivity in its implementation. He said President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had failed to abide by the law by not having established the KKR almost two years after its original April 2005 deadline.
"Added with the reality that the administration has not even set up the commission, we thought we should just scrap the whole law," he said.
The annulment of the KKR law has allowed President Yudhoyono, once a general in the Army, to escape, for the time being, from dealing with past human rights abuses that are believed to have involved his seniors in the military.
The commission seeks investigation and possible amnesty and reconciliation regarding human rights cases from 1945 to 2000.
The establishment of KKR is legally mandated in a 2000 People's Consultative Assembly decree that rules on how to deal with human rights violations. The decree is an extension of articles on human rights in the Constitution.
Aceh Monitoring Mission (AMM) head Pieter Feith, whose mandate to ensure the Aceh MoU was fully met up ends on Dec. 15, said he was taking the government's word for its commitment to human rights reconciliation in Aceh, including the creation of a commission for truth and reconciliation for Aceh. But Feith added that, unsurprisingly, GAM leaders had not been pressed either the AMM or the Indonesia government on the subject.
Aside from creating a reconciliation commission, the MoU also calls for the establishment of a human rights court for Aceh.