The full name of the IPT 1965 is ‘The International People’s Tribunal on Crimes Against Humanity in Indonesia 1965’. In March 2013 a group of exiles, activists and academics assembled in The Hague to organize a People’s Tribunal to assess the massacres and the other mass crimes against humanity committed in Indonesia after the ‘events of October 1 1965’. This first group convened after the launch of the monumental film by Joshua Oppenheimer ‘The Act of Killing’ in The Hague, The Netherlands. The film’s director and a former member of Indonesia’s National Human Rights Commission also attended.
In the absence of any formal national or international process of truth seeking or justice around these crimes against humanity it was decided that a People’s Tribunal was a major way forward to make the voices of the victims heard, to stimulate a process of truth seeking and to get national and internetional attention to the mass crimes against humanity committed in Indonesia. Nursyahbani Katjasungkana, who had been the Indonesian chief prosecutor for the Indonesian comfort women, in the 2000 Women’s International War Crimes Tribunal on Japan’s Military Sexual Slavery agreed to become the general coordinator, of the IPT 1965, a position she fulfils till now. In March 2014 the Foundation IPT 1965 was formally established, with Saskia Wieringa as chair, Sri Budiarti Tunruang as treasurer and Andreas Sungkono as member.
The aim of the Foundation was to break the cycle of impunity around these mass crimes and ‘to affirm the uncompromising hope that justice is still possible […] and to contribute to the creation of a political climate in Indonesia where human rights and the rule of law are recognised and respected.’
The hearings of the IPT 1965 were held in The Hague, between 10 – 13 November 2015. The year marks the 50- year anniversary of the so called events of 1965, the action of the 30 September Movement. This movement abducted and killed six generals and one lieutenant. General Suharto, who had prior knowledge of the action, immediately started a mass campaign of annihilation of the PKI, its affiliated organizations and staunch supporters of President Sukarno. The perpetrators of these mass crimes against humanity have never been brought to justice and the campaign of propaganda which incited the army and militia trained by them to commit these crimes have never been officially disavowed. The number of victims of the massacres, forced disapperances and the other crimes committed is still now known, as is the number and locations of the many mass graves all over the country. In 2012 the National Commission on Human Richts (KomnasHAM) presente dan extensive report on these crimes to the Attorney General’s Office in Jakarta but it was rejected.
During the two years of preparation for the hearings preparatory meetings were held both in Europe and in Indonesia. Several times these meetings were disrupted by members of militia, such as in Bukittinggi. The media team of the IPT 1965 built a website and a Facebook page and reached out to media in Indonesia and elsewhere. They also livestreamed the sessions, which were attended buy thousands of activists and students particularly in Indonesia. Fund raising proved to be extremely difficult.
The prosecutors held the state of Indonesia responsible for mass killings, imprisonment, enslavement, torture, forced disappearance, sexual violence, exile and mass propaganda. The United States, the United Kingdom and Autralia were charged with complicity. The judges concluded that sufficient evidence had been brought before them to charge the State of Indonesia with responsibility for the commitment and perpetration of these crimes against humanity, particularly by the military of that state through the chain of command. Additionally they ruled that the crimes committed after October 1 1965 fall within the definition of the Genocide Convention, as they were committed with the specific intent to annihilate an Indonesian ‘national group’, one of the categories recognised in that convention.