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UNCLAS JAKARTA 001702 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR EAP, EAP/MTS, EAP/MLS, EAP/RSP, DRL, DRL/AWH 
NSC FOR E. PHU 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PHUM MARR MASS SNAR ID
SUBJECT: MEETING LEAHY AMENDMENT REQUIREMENTS IN INDONESIA 
 
REF: STATE 89639 
 
¶1.  (SBU) This is an Action Request.  Please see para 11. 
 
¶2.  (SBU) SUMMARY:  Post trained close to 2000 members of the 
Indonesian military and police in 2007 who were subject to 
Leahy Amendment human rights vetting.  Post faces a central 
problem with current interpretations of the Leahy Amendment: 
although the political-military thrust of U.S. policy is to 
use the re-establishment of relations with Indonesian 
military and security services to build a strong ally in the 
war on terror, we are prohibited from training security 
forces who manage Indonesia's response to direct threats. 
The second goal of engagement is to promote security sector 
reform here, yet the U.S. is unable to train members of the 
military or police even when many of those are not charged 
with gross human rights violations.  Post recommends finding 
a way to allow younger members of the police and military to 
receive U.S. training, which includes establishing a time 
limit after which members of a tainted unit can be trained. 
END SUMMARY. 
 
CURRENT PROCEDURES 
------------------ 
 
¶3.  (SBU)  According to current guidelines, all training of 
security forces that is funded by the Foreign Operations 
Assistance Act or the Defense Appropriations Act is subject 
to the human rights vetting requirements of their respective 
Leahy Amendments.  For each proposed trainee, Embassy Jakarta 
conducts a name check of available data bases and open 
sources.  If the name check reveals credible allegations that 
the individual was responsible for gross violations of human 
rights, he/she is ineligible for training.  Under new vetting 
rules, if the individual's current unit of assignment has a 
record of responsibility for gross violations of human 
rights, as previously determined by decisions of the 
Department of State, then any individual currently assigned 
to that unit will be ineligible for training. 
 
BACKGROUND 
---------- 
 
¶4.  (SBU)  For the Indonesian military, the Ministry of 
Defense maintains a centralized personnel system that 
facilitates access to name check information.  In addition, 
training programs are identified and agreed well in advance 
through semiannual defense discussions.  For the Indonesian 
National Police, which has over 350,000 members serving on 
6,000 separate islands, there is no centralized personnel 
system.  The police require significantly longer to obtain 
the names and data on each trainee.  Of the training subject 
to Leahy Law requirements, Department of Defense programs 
included 342 individuals in 2007 (45 of these under IMET); 
Department of State programs included 1,652 individuals in 
¶2007. 
 
¶5.  (SBU)  In 2005 the Secretary ended a 13-year embargo on 
security cooperation with Indonesia, and in 2007 President 
Bush told President Yudhoyono that the United States wanted 
to increase security cooperation.  Embassy Jakarta has taken 
every precaution to ensure that no perpetrator of gross 
violations of human rights receives U.S. training assistance. 
 Nevertheless, implementation of the Leahy Amendment has 
prevented cooperation with several of the units most crucial 
for USG interests due to their responsibility for past human 
rights violations.  For events from 2005 onward, these forces 
have not been the object of credible allegations of gross 
violations of human rights. 
 
MILITARY 
-------- 
 
¶6.  (SBU)  For trainees serving in the Indonesian military, 
most vetting can take place quickly.  The most credible 
allegations of gross violations of human rights concern 
incidents that occurred ten years ago in East Timor and 
during the instability that accompanied the fall of Suharto, 
although some incidents took place since then.  It is 
relatively easy to scan available databases for allegations 
relating to individuals and to identify those units that are 
alleged to have been involved.  Most of those individuals 
against whom there have been specific allegations have 
retired or are now too senior to qualify for USG-funded 
training.  Under the new rules, however, younger officers, 
who were not in service at the time of the human rights 
violations, will be denied training if they are currently 
serving in a unit that had at one time been implicated. 
 
POLICE 
------ 
 
¶7.  (SBU)  Regarding the police, the situation is similar. 
In the four years that we have records of vetting trainees 
individually, including information from service records that 
would have indicated prior service in a unit implicated in 
gross violations of human rights, fewer than three percent of 
those vetted served in locations at times when police 
allegedly committed gross human rights violations.  Under the 
current procedures, however, those currently serving in units 
accused of prior violations will be barred, without recourse, 
even though the specific trainee may not even have been in 
service at the time of the violation. 
 
¶8.  (SBU)  Embassy Jakarta has a full record of individuals 
cleared by the Department for training, which provides 
authoritative guidance on which units in either the police or 
the military have had members cleared for training on the 
basis of their membership in that unit.  Embassy Jakarta will 
follow that record in vetting. 
 
WHAT ARE THE PROBLEMS? 
---------------------- 
 
¶9.  (SBU)  The central problem with current vetting 
procedures is that the main political-military thrust of U.S. 
policy is to use the re-establishment of relations with 
Indonesian military and security services to build a strong 
ally in the war on terror.  The police and military are 
structured in a way that each has an elite force that manages 
crises and counters direct threats to security of the state. 
The military's elite force is KOPASSUS, the 5,000-member Army 
special forces, many of whom are in the UN Peacekeeping force 
in Lebanon.  The police's elite force is BRIMOB, the 
32,000-member Mobile Brigade with a direct role in protecting 
embassies, countering terrorism, human trafficking, 
narcotics, intellectual property rights violations, and 
environmental crimes.  Mobile Brigade is also heavily 
involved in disaster response, which is one of our largest 
training programs, and will supply 70 percent of the 
peacekeepers scheduled to deploy to Darfur in September.  The 
current interpretation of the Leahy amendment impedes - at 
times, prevents - training of those forces most critical to 
the achievement of U.S. policy objectives in Indonesia. 
 
RECOMMENDATIONS 
--------------- 
 
¶10.  (SBU)  Embassy Jakarta proposes the following options as 
a way forward to ensure that no violators of human rights 
receive U.S. training while also training the forces engaged 
in promoting important U.S. policies.  First, establish a 
time limit for units after which a unit charged with past 
violations can again be trained; five years would seem to be 
reasonable period.  Second, allow individual members of a 
unit associated with human rights violations to be "vetted 
clean"; if a database scan and review of a full service 
record revealed no credible evidence of violations by that 
individual, he/she would be eligible for USG-funded training. 
 This approach would encourage the internal reform within 
units that previously had problems.  Specifically, we need to 
train younger members of the police and military, who were 
not even in the service at the time of the violations, to 
drive internal reforms.  This change is essential to our 
ability to promote reform of Indonesia's security forces. 
 
ACTION REQUEST 
-------------- 
 
¶11.  (SBU)  Mission requests policy-level Department 
consideration of the recommendations mentioned above to 
permit continuation of robust security-sector training in key 
areas of U.S. foreign policy interest. 
HUME