Korban dari perang atau memang dikorbankan ? >From Indo-News.com ********************************************************** Wednesday, February 17, 1999 Order to burn Australians By HAMISH McDONALD, Foreign Editor Indonesia's current Information Minister was named yesterday as the man most likely to have led soldiers who killed five Australian-based newsmen in 1975, dressed them in military uniforms for propaganda photographs, then burnt their bodies. The second inquiry by the former chairman of the National Crime Authority, Mr Tom Sherman, into the deaths of the television newsmen at Balibo, East Timor, has thrown an extraordinary challenge to the Foreign Minister, Mr Downer, for his visit to Indonesia next week. In contrast to his first report in June 1996, Mr Sherman has squarely assigned responsibility for the attack on Indonesian regular troops. And he has found that the then Special Forces captain, Yunus Yosfiah, was "most likely" in charge and had the dead journalists photographed in military uniforms before their bodies were burnt. Mr Yunus is now the Information Minister in the Indonesian Government, and Mr Downer can be expected to meet him next week either in Australia-Indonesian ministerial talks in Bali or later in Jakarta. Mr Downer will also meet the Indonesian President, Dr B.J. Habibie, in Jakarta on February 25 for talks on the future of Timor. Mr Yunus has denied even being in Balibo during the attack. Mr Sherman's report, tabled in Federal Parliament yesterday, does not accuse Mr Yunus of murder, or premeditation. He accepts that some Indonesian officers higher up the chain of command "knew of the possible presence of journalists in Balibo prior to the attack" but found no evidence that the attacking troops had been told of the journalists. Mr Sherman emphasises that the attackers were laying down a hail of fire, possibly in pre-dawn half light, with some counter-fire from defending troops of the pro-independence Fretilin movement, and would be inclined to "shoot first and ask questions afterwards" at any sign of movement. He adds that any attempts to surrender "would have been futile in those circumstances". But the bombshell in the report, for Mr Downer and his hosts next week, is that Mr Sherman concludes "it is even clearer from the new information that the attack was controlled and directed by Indonesian Special Forces and Red Beret commando officers". And "it is now clear" that "the attacks on Balibo and Maliana [on October 16, 1975] were at the start of a general offensive by Indonesian military forces to annex East Timor". Tabling the report yesterday, Mr Downer said he had sent a copy to the Indonesian Foreign Minister, Mr Ali Alatas, asking for any help Jakarta could give to "cast more light" on the deaths of the Balibo five - Gary Cunningham, Brian Peters, Malcolm Rennie, Greg Shackleton and Tony Stewart - and of Australian journalist Roger East in Dili. But the Opposition foreign affairs spokesman, Mr Laurie Brereton, immediately attacked Mr Downer, saying Australia "cannot consider the case closed without a full account of the events at Balibo from the Indonesian side, including the role or otherwise of the present Minister for Information and others in the military chain of command".
