For Workers Revolution to Sweep Away Suharto Dictatorship!
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__ Australasian ______....... _____ 11 v ~DARTAClST1FAGUE .......... _... ~-. P.O. BOX 3381 50 Number 160 Summer 1996/97 CHURCH ST. STATtON cents - - -- - --- NEW YUM", .... T IUUUO ,.. 212 - 267-1025 For Workers Revolution to Sweep Away Suharto Dictatorship! Massive protests against Suharto dictatorship during July were met with brutal crackdown, Including arrests of trade unionists and leftists. Indonesia Powder Keg The military regime of Indonesian diC the group. All are in isolatiOn, and there of aU those ·impristmed [stepage 2ff designation "BT" (ex-Tahanan Politik tator Suharto is facing the most convul have been reports of electric shock and "The regime's tirades against a supposed former political prisoner) from the ident sive political and social upheaval in other torture being used to force con 'Communist threat' evoked-as was in ity papers of some 1.4 million people. decades. fessions. Leaders of the PRO-afftliated tended-the spectre of the horrendous One of these, writer Pramoedya Ananta On July 8, army troops, marines anti-Communist bloodbath of workers and police brutally attacked a strike and trade union, peasants union a~d student and peasants carried out by the military Toor, has been accused of being a leader rally of 20,000 workers in the east Java group were also arrested PRO offices in and by anti-Communist mobs in 1965. of "formless organizations" -a reference city of Surabaya. Later that month, Jakarta and Surabaya have been seized The message wall as clear as it was to Communist front groups-and his police, troops and rightist vigilantes in arid ransacked·1be military has ordered brutal: All who oppose Suharto's 'New writings are banned. His novels, like Order' government will be slaughtered in the capital city of Jakarta stormed the the arrest of all PRO supporters and the same manner as were the more than Child of All Nations and This Earth of headquarters of the Indonesian Demo announced that they will likely be tried one million supporters of the Indonesian Man/drld, are powerful indictments of cratic Party (pOI), one of two tame oppo under the 1962 anti-subversion law, Communist Party (PKI) and other militants 'brutal exploitation by the former Outch sition parties permitted by the military which carries a maximum penalty of in 1965 and the workers and peasants of colonial rulers. Today they are banned dictatorship. Supporters of opposition death. East Timor who have been fighting for by an authoritarian regime which fears their independence for over 20 years." leader Megawati ·Sukarnoputri, daughter Determined to crush the PRO, the that readers might see too many parallels o( former Indonesian ruler Sukarno, had government has denounced it as "analo Suharto's blood-soaked regime was between the situation then and now. occupied the building to protest her gous" to the earlier Communist Party. As born out of the 1965 massacre. Old and U.S. imperialism has played a key role. ouster from the POI leadership in a we noted in a recent protest statement sick men condemned as Communist ac in propping up the bloody Suharto dic- . government-orchestrated maneuver in sent by the Partisan Defense Committee tivists following the 1965 bloodbath are tatorship from the time of the 1965 anti June. in Japan to the Indonesian ambassador still sitting on death row. Only last year Communist massacre. The recent flap More than 10,000 people took to the there demanding the inlmediate release did the regime say it would remove the continued on page 4 streets in outrage over the government's raid on the POI building, and banks and government buildings were torched. The military ordered demonstrators shot on sight; at least five protesters were of ficially reported dead and 74 "disap peared." The regime then launched a countrywide manhunt against a wide range of dissidents. At least nine are charged with "subversion," punishable by . death. While Megawati was pulled in several times for lengthy police interrog ation, the main targets were not POI supporters but trade-union. organizers and supporters of the leftist People's Oemocratic Party (PRO). Among those arrested was Muchtar Pakpahan, chairman of the banned Indo nesian Workers for Prosperity Union (SBSI), the largest of the independent unions. Arrested for playing a leading role in strike struggles in Medan in April 1994, Pakpahan's conviction was over turned last October. Now he faces the death penalty on charges of subversion stemming from the July 27 protest. Budi man Sudjatmiko, 27-year-old leader of the PRO, was also hunted down and faces the firing squad for treason. At Der Spiegel Russell least 25 PRO leaders are being held, PKI support to bourgeois-nationalist Sukarno regime prepared the way for 1965 massacre of leftists, workers according to an overseas spokesman for and peasants by CIA-backed military and Islamic anti-Communist mobs. The regime's tirades against a sup posed "Communist threat" evoked-as Charges Against Pa.·~isa ..·Defe .. ce was intended-the spectre of the hor rendous anti~Communist bloodbath of Jane Kemelfield <DnuniUee' workers and peasants carried out by the military and by anti-Communist mobs in CLASS STRUGGLE DEFENCE NOTES 1965o-The message was as clear as it was Dropped brutal: All who oppose Suharto's "New Order" government will be slaughtered On 10 December the Melbourne Magis in the same manner as were the more trates Court dismissed charges against than one million supporters of the student activist Jane Kemeljield. Reprinted Japanese Trotskyists Defend' Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and below is the 9 December PDC letter ad other militants in 1965 and the workers dressed to the VICtorian attorney general. Copies were sent to the state police com and peasants of East Timor who have been fighting for their independence for missioner and the La Trobe University Indonesian Leftists over 20 years. Council and vice-chancellor. The following statement protesting the ing vicious assault on the headquarters The so-called Indonesian "miracle" Dear Madam, recent repression in Indonesia was sent to of the Indonesian Democratic Party has been accomplished through super the Indonesian ambassador in, Japan on 19 (PDI). Drop all charges against those exploitation and built on the sweat and We strongly protest the outrageous August by the Partisan Defence Committee currently imprisoned and those being blood of the Indonesian proletariat and criminal charges brought against Jane there. Since then it has been reported that hunted down! In addition to supporters peasants. Kemelfield. Kemelfield, the 1996 124 supporters of Megawati Sukarnoputri of the PDI, Muchtar Pakpahan, leader The banks and office buildings torched president of the La Trobe University have been released, while union leader of the banned SBSI trade-union feder on July 27 were the symbols of a ruling Students' Representative Council, has Muchtar Pakpahan and at least nine Partai ation, and Budiman Sudjatmiko, presi class who number among some of the been charged over an August 1995 occu Rakyat Demokrat militantS including Bu.di dent of the Partai Rakyat Demokrat world's richest billionaires. Indonesia'S pation of the administration building, man Sudjatmikocontinue to languish in the (PRD), andOlhers have been arrested gap between rich and poor is one of the protesting the withholding of funding for dictatorship's dungeons facing the death and charged with treason, a capital widest in Asia, and continues to grow; the SRC. She was arrested a full seven sentence. Meanwhile· the military regime crime. more than 30 million live in "absolute months after the occupation and charged ·with "incitement" and "criminal damage." , announced the arrests of an unnamed Less than 36 hours after the imperial poverty." The bourgeoisie is moving into number of East Timorese, who face up to The maximum penalty for each offence ist bosses of ASEAN and their counter walled, guarded enclaves surrounded by 20 years' imprisonment for "insulting the . is seven and a half years jail. Kemel parts jetted out of the country, the the millions who labor in their fields and head ofstate" (UP/, 29 November). Free all . factories, making less than ¥200 a day field's "crime" was that she addressed military brutally evicted supporters of victims of Suharto's right-wing repression, and living in shanties without running protesters over a megaphone prior to the Megawati Sukarnoputri from the head from Jakarta to Dili, now! water. occupation. quarters ofthe opposition PDI, sparking The Kennett government's so-called The size and of the July the most concerted anti-government d~termination "Voluntary Student Unionism" (VSU) 27 protests speak to a deep-going oppo 19 August 1996 protests in 20 years.' Thousands battled legislation, under which the Adminis sition to the repressive Suharto dictator tration cut off funds to the SRC, was troops and heavily armed riot police who ship. We demand that all detained be Dear Ambassador Wisber Loeis, transparently designed to cripple student were ordered to "shoot on sight." At released and all charges be dropped. We demand the immediate release of least 200 were arrested, three killed, 90 political dissent. Not content with at those imprisoned' for protesting the injured and scores are still listed as Sincerely, tempting to stifle student protest against Indonesian military's July 27 early morn- "missing." Hirata Motomu ·education cutbacks and social injustice through financial manipulation, the government has. resorted to police state repression. The 1995 editors of the La · Trobe University student paper Robelais, Ben Ross, Melita Berndt, Valentina Defend 19-20 August Canberra Demonstrators!" ~ Srpcanska and Michael Brown continue to be dragged through the court system Reprinted below is a protest letter sent to economic and social agenda of the co!llpelled to again defend themselves. for publishing "objectionable material." the federal attorney general and the ACT Howard Conservative Coalition.