“This morning, I asked all related ministers, and especially in connection with human rights violations, to follow up from what I had announced last week,” the head of state noted at the Presidential Palace in Jakarta on Monday.
President Widodo urged all relevant ministers to join the follow-up on the non-judicial handling of the statement he had made regarding the handling of serious human rights violations in the past.
According to Widodo, it becomes one of the points that had been instructed during the first plenary cabinet meeting in 2023.
“We must strengthen the foundation of political stability, democracy, legal certainty, and a sense of justice and uphold human rights,” he stated.
On a separate occasion, Coordinating Minister for Politics, Legal, and Security Affairs Mahfud MD noted after the cabinet meeting that President Joko Widodo will issue the Presidential Instruction for 17 ministries and government agencies to work on a recommendation of the Team for the Non-Judicial Resolution of Serious Human Rights Violations (PPHAM).
One of the president’s directives is to assign Coordinating Minister of Politics, Legal and Security Affairs Mahfud MD, Minister for Foreign Affairs Retno Marsudi, and Minister of Law and Human Rights Yassona H. Laoly to gather Indonesian citizens, who were the victims of serious human rights violations and currently live in East Europe, in order to ensure that their rights are restored.
Minister of Public Works and Housing Basuki Hadimuljono is thereafter assigned to ensure the construction and/or repair of infrastructure at locations where serious human rights violations occurred in the past.
Earlier, President Joko Widodo had stated on Wednesday, January 11, 2023, that the government of Indonesia acknowledges the serious human rights violations in 12 incidents that occurred in the past.
The president expressed his deep sympathy and empathy to all victims while ensuring that the government will strive to restore their rights in a fair and wise manner without negating the effort of a judicial settlement and made efforts, so that no serious human rights violations will occur again in Indonesia in the future.
The 12 occurrences are the 1965-1966 incident; the 1982-1985 mysterious shootings; the Talangsari incident in Lampung in 1989; the Rumoh Geudong and Pos Sattis in Aceh in 1989; the forced disappearance incident in 1997-1998; and the May 1998 riots.
The other events were the1998-1999 Trisakti and Semanggi I-II incident; the 1998-1999 witchcraft murder; the 1999 Simpang KKA Aceh incident; the 2001-2002 Wasior Papua incident; the 2003 Wamena Papua incident; and the 2003 Jambo Keupok Aceh incident.
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