Indonesia’s protests over the economy turn to police brutality
The protests caused by economic problems in Indonesia triggered the concerns that the Southeast Asian nation could return to its authoritarian past, and a heavy response from the police.
Police trucks were repulsed with anti -law enforcement slogans, while President Prabowo Subio condemned the demonstrations as “betrayal and terrorism” while trying to gain extensive discontent.
Thousands of people went to the streets in big cities last week, from time to time, the riots who opened fire on government buildings and joined the looters looking for the homes of politicians. At least 10 people were killed and hundreds were injured in the next unrest.
On Wednesday, a student unions met with deputies and demanded an independent investigation into the police violence and protested more.
Since Prabowo, a former military general and businessman, received power last year, the disappointments of the world’s third largest democracy are being built by applying arco squeezing measures that reduce billions from public services such as health and education.
Many ordinary Indonesian government, even when youth unemployment and wages become stagnant, criticizing it for serving the interests of the rich elite.
The first demonstration wave began on August 25, and thousands of people came together outside the parliament of the country to solve an example of such an inequality: a housing allowance of $ 3,000 for MPs with approximately 10 times the minimum wage in Jakarta.
The discontent rose to violence when a 21 -year -old motorcycle taxi driver was hit by a fatal way by an armored police vehicle accelerating through the crowd.
Prabowo and the police chief apologized for the incident and one of the officers involved in the accident was fired.
At a news conference on television, Prabowo stressed that the right to peaceful parliament should be protected, but that the state should take steps to protect its citizens ”.
Neither these measures nor the promise of reducing the advantages of the president’s deputies did not suppress the explosion of public rage, which was met with a police reaction to the human rights groups.
Montse Ferrer, the Eastern and Southeast Asian Research Director of the International Amnesty International, said, “Nobody should die while exercising the right to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly.”
On Monday, the United Nations called for an investigation on the fact that unnecessary or disproportionate power is used by the security forces ”.
Since the demonstrations began, Indonesian police used tear gas, water balls and rubber bullets against protesters with molotov cocktails and rocks. Authorities arrested more than 3,000 people.
Police pressure was attributed to two deaths: A Pedicab driver who died while being treated for tear gas exposure in the city alone and apparently a university student who died on Sunday after being beaten by the police.
Jacqui Baker, an Indonesian security and policing scholar at the University of Murdoch in Perth, Australia, said that such events re -revealed the insecurity of the Indonesian people in the police force.
“Ordinary people for a long time ‘report a chicken, lose a buffalo’, that is, if you include the police in the routine law enforcement officers … You will experience more financial loss than the original theft,” he said.
In recent years, civilian groups have accused of dozens of murder and torture without dozens of trials.
Most of the country’s policing problems stem from a three -year authoritarian rule under President Suharto, which ended in 1998.
While the police adhered to political interests even after the democratization of the country, Baker said, “The sense of historical authority created a deeply corrupted, severe and predatory force, which was largely hated by ordinary people.
President Prabowo himself is accused of violations of human rights, such as the abduction of dissidents under Suharto’s rule. Critics say that the army is now withdrawing the participation of civilian institutions and now withdrew the country to authoritarianism. Prabowo rejects these claims.
