'Pak' Prabowo seeks to 'clear' his name over Timor atrocities allegations in media jousting

Beatriz looks for her husband among the bodies after the 1983 Kraras massacre, as portrayed in
Beatriz's War, East Timor's first feature film.

By DAVID ROBIE

INDONESIAN presidential hopeful ‘Pak” Prabowo, the retired Kopassus general notorious for his alleged human rights violations in Timor-Leste, has finally broken his silence and made a statement to the Jakarta Post denouncing a recent article about his past as “scurrilous allegations”.

Yet his odious record speaks for itself.

He claims in an open letter that allegations about his actions three decades ago, notably the massacre in August 1983 in Kraras - now known as the “village of widows",  were "based on unproven allegations, innuendos and third-hand reports".

What was he forced to reply to? Journalist Aboeprijadi Santoso, a contributor  to The Jakarta Post writing from the safety of Amsterdam, had written an article entitled: “Whatever happened in Kraras, Timor-Leste, ‘Pak’ Prabowo?”

Timor-Leste soldiers and young citizens paying homage
to the Kraras  massacre victims in 2013.
Photo: David Robie

He was referring to the massacre that has been immortalised in Beatriz's War, the harrowing new film about the Timorese struggle for independence from Indonesia, especially telling the story from a woman's perspective.

Heroine Beatriz (a composite character created from real life people) was a survivor from the Kraras massacre. Prabowo is depicted as being responsible for many human rights atrocities in the film.

Santoso recently described Prabowo as one of the “most interesting – and most controversial” presidential hopefuls in the Indonesian elections due in July because he has reinvented himself as an anti-corruption campaigner. 

Remembering East Timor's Kraras massacre 30 years on

Police, military perimeter guards and the public watch
the 38th independence anniversary parade at the
"widows village" of Kraras. Mobile photo: David Robie/PMC

By DAVID ROBIE in Dili

ON 28 November 1975, Timor-Leste made its fateful unilateral declaration of independence. A week later, a paranoid Indonesian military, fearful of an upstart "leftwing" neighbouring government, staged its brutal invasion and 24 years of repression and massacres followed.

On 17 September 1983, the infamous massacre of at least 300 civilians (probably a far higher number) took place at the village of Kraras and Wetuka River near Viqueque.

This heralded the end of the so-called ceasefire between Indonesian and Falintil forces and led to the long guerrilla struggle against Jakarta's harsh rule.

This week, the people of Kraras - the "village of widows" - proudly hosted the 38th anniversary of Timor-Leste independence; the real date, not the "rewritten" post-UN date. They also honoured the 30th anniversary of the Kraras massacre.

The massacre has been graphically portrayed in Timor-Leste's first feature film, Beatriz's War, and it was fitting that this movie should be screened to thousands of Timorese in an open-air arena at the independence festival this week.