National

Hasan Tiro and Other GAM Top Leaders Put on Trial
Saturday, 19 June, 2004 | 11:41 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta:The Stockholm District Court put three top leaders of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) residing in Sweden, Hasan Tiro, Malik Mahmud and Zaini Abdullah, on trial on Friday (18/06).

The trial was held to decide on whether or not the detention on these three suspects could be extended or not.

Swedish security personnel detained Tiro and the other GAM leaders on Tuesday (15/06) as they were allegedly involved in acts of terrorism in Indonesia.

As terrorism case suspects, they could only be detained for three days based on Swedish law.

Apart from Hasan Tiro, who was sick and could not be detained, the other two suspects have undergone three-day detention period.

Swedish authorities might not be able to extend the detention of these three GAM leaders as the Stockholm had difficulty in finding an independent Acehnese language translator.

Stockholm Prosecutors' Office head, Thomas Lindstrand, told the Swedish newspaper, Dagens Nyheter, that most of the evidence possessed by the Prosecutors' Office were dossiers in the Acehnese language.

Though he found difficulties in looking for translators, Lindstrand promised to try extending the detention of the GAM leaders.

"They are alleged to have violated Swedish Criminal Law Chapter 22 Article 6 on International Law Violation," Lindstrand told Tempo News Room by phone on Thursday (17/06).(Faisal A/Wahyu D/David Hulth/Yandhrie A-Koran Tempo)