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Torture
From the invasion of 1975 till the end of the occupation in 1999, the Indonesian military committed widespread and systematic torture against the people of East Timor.
The following acts of torture were common1:
- Beating with fists or with implements such as a wooden club or a branch, an iron bar, a rifle butt, chains, a hammer, a belt or electric cables
- Kicking, usually while wearing military or police boots, including around the head and face
- Punching and slapping
- Whipping
- Cutting with a knife
- Cutting with a razor blade
- Placing the victim's toes under the leg of a chair or table and then having one or more people sit on it
- Burning the victim's flesh, including the victim's genitalia with cigarettes or a gas lighter
- Applying electric shocks to different parts of the victim's body, including the victim's genitalia
- Firmly tying someone's hands and feet or tying the victim and hanging him or her from a tree or roof
- Using water in various ways, including holding a person's head under water; keeping a victim in a water tank for a prolonged period, sometimes up to three days; soaking and softening a victim's skin in water before beating the victim; placing the victim in a drum filled with water and rolling it; pouring very hot or very cold water over the victim; pouring very dirty water or sewage over the victim
- Sexual harassment, sexual forms of torture and ill-treatment or rape.
- Cutting off a victim's ear to mark the victim
- Tying the victim behind a car and forcing him or her to run behind it or be dragged across the ground
- Placing lizards with sharp teeth and claws (lafaek rai maran) in the water tank with the victim and then goading it to bite the softened skin on different parts of the victim's body including the victim's genitalia
- Pulling out of fingernails and toenails with pliers
- Running over a victim with a motor-bike
- Forcing a victim to drink a soldier's urine or eat non-food items such as live small lizards or a pair of socks
- Leaving the victim in the hot sun for extended periods
- Humiliating detainees in front of their communities, for example by making them stand or walk through the town naked
- Threatening the victim or the victim's family with death or harming a member of the victim's family in front of them
It should be noted that the prohibition against torture has long been contained in Indonesia's own Criminal Code, KUHP (Kitab Undang-undang Hukum Pidana). Indonesian military personnel who committed torture and other crimes against humanity remain at large in Indonesia where they constitute an ongoing threat to Indonesia's own democratic transition.
1 Chega! Executive Summary p 104-5.
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