REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- Attorney General HM Prasetyo said he is optimistic he could settle as soon as possible all cases of gross human right violations where his predecessor and all attorney generals before him had failed.
"At least during the term of the present government (all unsettled cases of human right violation would be settled)", Prasetyo said after a meeting on human right cases with Coordinating Minister for Political Affairs, Law and Security Tedjo Edhy Purdijatno, Military Chief Gen. Moeldoko, Chief of the National Intelligence Agency Marciano Norman, Law and Human rights Minister Yasonna H Laoly here on Thursday.
He said reconciliation attempts in the process of settling the cases should go through phases that the allegation was true of human right violation.
"After that a statement and a commitment is made that there would be no more similar types of violation in the future.
"Then the state would apologize to the victims of gross human right violation. It is in one package," he said.
The Truth Unveiling Committee, which will have 15 members under the president will prepare non judicial settlement, he added.
The committee has the duty to socialize and complete the steps that have been taken by the government in settling the cases, he said.
"(The Committee) prepares settlement non judicially. A lot has been done. Therefore, preparation is made that the people could see. There is socialization, explanation and other things that need to be done together," he said.
Prasetyo's predecessor refused to follow up investigation of human rights cases repeatedly returning reports submitted by the Indonesian Human Right Commission.
Earlier, the Commission for Disappeared People and Victims of Violence (Kontras) urged President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) to immediately issue a presidential instruction to process legal cases of human rights violation of the past.
Earlier the Agency for Witness and Victim Protection (LPSK) called for immediate settlement of cases of gross violation of human rights in the past.
"The past human right cases should not continue to burden us as it would be difficult for us to lift ourselves from the problem" LPSK chairman Abdul Haris Semendawai said in a statement.
Abdul Haris said in many other countries gross human right cases are settled either at court or out of court.
He said there should be impunity to perpetrators of human right violation.
He said if cases are to be settled through reconciliation; the team of reconciliation must not be made up only of state officials, but must involve independent bodies and the victims themselves.
What is most important that need serious addressing is the rights of the victims to justice and compensation, he said.
The Commission for Disappeared People and Victims of Violence (Kontras) had also urged President Joko Widodo to immediately issue a presidential instruction to process legal cases of human rights violation of the past.
"Kontras asks the President to issue a Presidential Instruction to the Attorney General to carry out investigations into seven cases of which the National Commission for Human Rights already completed its own investigations," a Kontras leader Haris Azhar said.
Kontras also asked President Jokowi to issue a decision to set up an ad hoc court for cases of past human right violation.
The nongovernmental organization founded by Munir Said Thalib, a human right activist who died believed to be poisoned, also asked the attorney general and Right Commission to be focused on settling the case, Haris said.
"The public needs to know the attorney general office already returned six times the dossiers prepared by the Right Commission on the seven cases," he said.
In addition, there should be official statement by the government expressing an apology to the victims recognizing the past injustice.