The shockingly lenient verdict handed
down by a West Papua court to a police officer charged with illegal
logging, fuel smuggling and money laundering is an appalling indictment
of Indonesia’s utter failure to tackle corruption within the
forestry sector and the strongest evidence of a cover-up that the
Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) has witnessed for a long time.
Labora Sitorus, a low-ranking police
officer based in Sorong West Papua, was earlier this week found guilty
of just one of the charges – illegal logging – and was sentenced to two
years in prison and fined a mere US$4,000.
He was acquitted of money laundering,
despite evidence showing US$127 million passed through his accounts,
some of which was connected to shipments of timber that the judge has
now ruled to have been illegally taken.
In January 2013, enforcement officials
seized 2,264 cubic metres of merbau in 115 containers that had been
shipped from Sorong to Surabaya in East Java, Indonesia’s largest timber
trading port. The total value of this illegal timber is
estimated at US$20,370,600 (current market prices for merbau are
estimated at US$900 per cubic metre).
Further investigations led the
Financial Transaction Monitoring Centre (PPATK) to reveal that Sitorus
had paid up to US$1million to local, regional and national police
officials between January and March 2013.
In September 2013, when prosecutors
were given the dossier from the police that allowed Sitorus to be
charged, the issue of corruption was conspicuous by its absence. By
neglecting to charge Sitorus with corruption, 33 police officers who
allegedly received money from Sitorus were ignored.
This is not the first time that a case
involving police in Papua has failed to convict influential defendants.
Police Commissioner Marthen Renouw worked as a police officer in Papua
for 29 years, amassing a position of power stretching
from the capital of Jayapura to Sorong, where Labora Sitorus is also
based. Renouw was arrested in April 2005 during the unprecedented
enforcement operation codenamed OHL 11 and was transferred to Jakarta
for questioning.
Again, PPATK detected a series of
suspicious transactions involving five bank accounts. As in the case of
Sitorus, evidence was passed onto police to follow up but only one bank
account was scrutinised. With further evidence proving that
Renouw had received money from an illegal logging syndicate while he
was supposedly leading operations against timber theft in the area, the
Attorney General’s office charged Renouw under anti-corruption and
anti-money laundering laws. Renouw was brought to
trial in November 2006 in his power base of Jayapura. He was acquitted
of all charges.
EIA and partner Forest Watch Indonesia
(FWI) unreservedly condemn this latest blatant manipulation of the law
by the police, along with the risible verdict from the panel of judges
who have completely failed to bring to justice all those
responsible who profited from this forest crime. EIA/FWI is also
concerned that the SVLK, Indonesia’s new mandatory traceability scheme
intended to ensure the legality of all materials in Indonesia’s domestic
and export timber markets, was insufficiently robust
to stop this illegal act from occurring in the first place.
The company responsible for the
illegal logging and transport of the 115 containers of Merbau – PT Rotua
– was ultimately able to sell its illegal timber to exporting companies
certified as legally compliant under the SVLK. None have been
investigated or prosecuted.
With Sitorus now guilty of illegal
logging, EIA/FWI believe all his clients should have their SVLK
certificates revoked or, at the very least, be re-audited. It is highly
likely that all the illegal merbau sold on to traders by PT Rotua
has been or will be exported abroad. This is in direct violation of
Indonesian law.
Apart from the SVLK independent
monitors, the wider SVLK system and stakeholders have played no role at
all in preventing this multi-million dollar forest crime. Not one
company that dealt in and exported Sitorus’s illegal timber is being
investigated and prosecuted, including Sitorus’ own timber company,
which has been allowed to continue operating with apparent impunity.
The deeply compromised case against
Labora Sitorus and the subsequent failure of the judiciary is a major
warning that, despite all of the commitments and agreements the
Government has made to combat illegal logging and the associated illegal
trade, Indonesia has still to prove its commitment to enforce the law
against forest crime.
EIA has been aware of Sitorus and his
illegal activities since 2009, when investigators documented loggers
illegally harvesting merbau trees without Government approval. You can
view and embed the footage at
https://vimeo.com/67142131.
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