http://asia.news.yahoo.com/060721/afp/060721132012top.html
Friday July 21, 9:21 PM
Indonesian journalist to face trial over Prophet Mohammed cartoons
Photo: AFP
Click to enlarge
JAKARTA (AFP) - An Indonesian journalist detained for posting cartoons of the
Prophet Mohammed in his newspaper earlier this year has been released from
prison but will still face trial.
Teguh Santosa, 35, was freed from a Jakarta prison Thursday night after being
held there for 24 hours by the prosecutor's office, police detective Aries
Syarif Hidayat said on Friday.
Santosa, who is the chief editor of the Rakyat Merdeka Online newspaper, will
still have to face trial for publishing the cartoons in February, Hidayat said.
He faces a maximum five years' imprisonment.
"As long as he remains cooperative, there's no need for him to be detained,"
Hidayat, who heads Jakarta police cyber-crime unit, told AFP.
Prosecutors have indicted Santosa with two counts of "inciting animosity and
hatred" towards a specific religious group.
The Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten first printed 12 caricatures of the
Prophet Mohammed last September and a slew of other, mostly European,
newspapers have followed suit, sparking outrage in the Muslim world.
Islam considers images of the prophet to be blasphemous.
Santosa, quoted by the Koran Tempo newspaper on Friday, said he was only trying
to give readers a complete story on the controversial cartoons.
"It was in accordance with my job as a journalist," he reportedly said.
Reporters Without Borders criticised the police action.
"Santosa did not reproduce these cartoons in order to provoke," it said in a
statement released Thursday after he was detained.
"He did it with the aim of providing information, and his apologies are
evidence of this. We call for his immediate release and the withdrawal of the
charges, which are completely unjustified."
Denmark in February temporarily closed its mission in Indonesia, the world's
most populous Muslim nation, and warned its nationals to leave the country
after weeks of protests.
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