[NYTr] Sort-of-Tardy News: Indonesian Govt Killed Reporters in 1975
 
Date: Sat, 17 Nov 2007 02:52:03 -0600 (CST)

Via NY Transfer News Collective  *  All the News that Doesn't Fit
 
[No Shit, Sherlock News: 

In 1975 Indonesian forces killed 5 Australia-based journalists to
prevent their reporting the invasion of East Timor and their murder of
thousands. 32 years later, we need to get this word from an
Australian coroner?!? We all knew this at the time. 

In 1991 also, journalist Allan Nairn had his head cracked open by a
rifle butt and ended up with a serious concussion and other injuries,
and together with WBAI's Amy Goodman was lucky to escape with his life.
In those days, their yanqui passports were able to protect them
somewhat, since the US-backed Indonesian thugs were reluctant to kill
them when Amy held up her passport like some kind of shield. (That
wouldn't happen today, because the US wouldn't care.) The US backed the
Indonesians for years, was still doing so when Timor gained its
independence from Portugal in 1975 when the Indonesians
invaded, and was still doing so during the Dili massacre of 1991. It was
not until 1993 that the US finally cut off military aid to Indonesia
(for a while).

At any rate, for some reason, the Aussies have held a rather tardy
inquest into the death of 5 other journalists and have officially
announced what we all knew: the Indonesian soldiers murdered them and
covered it up. What a shock. The brazen Indonesians are still denying
it. 

Maybe in 32 years we'll be told that a US tank targeted those
journalists at the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad, that the invaders
deliberately bombed Al Jazeera's offices in Iraq, and intentionally
killed a Palestinian journalist whose camera, it was claimed, looked
like a weapon to a US soldier. -NY Transfer]

The New York Times - Nov 17, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/17/world/asia/17timor.html

Journalists Killed by Indonesian Army in 1975, Inquiry Finds

By TIM JOHNSTON

SYDNEY, Australia, Nov. 16 b An Australian coroner concluded Friday
that the Indonesian Army killed five Australia-based journalists at the
beginning of its 1975 invasion of East Timor to prevent news of an
Indonesian attack from reaching the outside world.

The inquiry found that the five journalists b Greg Shackleton and Tony
Stewart of Australia, Brian Peters and Malcolm Rennie of Britain, and
Gary Cunningham of New Zealand b were killed by Indonesian forces in
the village of Balibo, nearly two months before the Indonesian Army
took over all of East Timor, then a Portuguese colony.

Dorelle Pinch, the deputy state coroner for New South Wales, who
conducted the six-week inquest, said all five journalists were victims
of a war crime. She gave her findings to the Australian attorney
general, who has the power to initiate prosecutions.

The attorney general, Phillip Ruddock, said he would forward Ms.
Pinchbs recommendations to the police and prosecutors who have
responsibility for investigating and compiling war-crimes charges, The
Associated Press reported.

The inquiry found that Indonesian forces engaged in an elaborate
cover-up of the deaths. Ms. Pinch said they had dressed the bodies in
Portuguese military uniforms and photographed them with weapons before
burning them, hoping to prevent investigators from discovering that the
journalists were killed by shots from AK-47 assault rifles, which were
used by Indonesian troops at the time.

The Indonesian government has insisted that the five were killed in
cross-fire between Indonesian troops and Timorese nationalist fighters.

Kristiarto Legowo, a spokesman for the Indonesian Foreign Ministry,
rejected Ms. Pinchbs findings on Friday. bThe verdict will not change
our assertion on what happened in Balibo at the time, namely that those
five journalists were killed in a cross-fire,b Mr. Legowo told
journalists. bIt is a closed case.b

The inquiry began as a formal investigation into the death of Mr.
Peters alone, but Ms. Pinch said her findings applied to all five
journalists, known as the Balibo Five.

bBrian Raymond Peters died at Balibo in Timor-Leste on 16 October 1975
from wounds sustained when he was shot and/or stabbed deliberately, and
not in the heat of battle, by members of the Indonesian Special
Forces,b Ms. Pinch wrote. Timor-Leste is East Timorbs official name.

Mr. Peters was killed bto prevent him from revealing that Indonesian
Special Forces had participated in the attack on Balibo,b she wrote.

                                 *
=================================================================
 NY Transfer News Collective     *    A Service of Blythe Systems
           Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
            Our main website:   http://www.blythe.org
   List Archives:       http://blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
   Subscribe:     http://blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
=================================================================