Children of Indonesian Men Executed by Dutch Army Demand Damages

Cawi, a widow whose husband became one of the victims of the massacre by Dutch troops at Rawa Gede village in 1947, stands  near a row of graves of the victims.

 
The Hague, 04 Rajab 1438/01 April 2017 (MINA) – More than 500 children of men executed in Indonesia during the independence war of 1946 to 1949 are preparing damages claims against the Dutch state, the Dutch daily AD said on Friday.

Lawyer Liesbeth Zegveld has sent a list of 520 names to the defence and foreign affairs ministries, urging the state to settle their claims out of court, the paper said.

She wants the government to agree to give the children damages the same rights as the widows of the men killed. They are able to make an uncontested claim for damages, outside the courts.

The state, however, has said it wants to wait until the outcome of a test case brought by the children of men executed in southern Sulawesi. A lower court ruled in 2015 that they are entitled to compensation like their mothers.

The Dutch military interventions in Indonesia, or Dutch Indies as it was known then, followed the proclamation of the independent Republic of Indonesia in 1945 and lasted until the country formally gained independence in 1949 after a bloody struggle.

At the end of 2011, the Netherlands finally formally apologised for the massacre of hundreds of men and boys in the Javanese village of Rawagede in 1947.

The men were killed by the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army, since the people of the village would not tell where the Indonesian independence fighter Captain Lukas Kustario was hiding

A report from the United Nations published on 12 January 1948 called the killings “deliberate and merciless”.

Last year, the Dutch government agreed to set up a major inquiry into the structural use of violence in Indonesia. (T/RS5/RS1)

Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA)