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Article: Touching the Untouchable.(trial - Suharto)(Indonesia)(Brief Article)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- September 2, 2000
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2000 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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JAKARTA
HE WAS thought, at least in Indonesia, to be the Untouchable. The description has, of course, been applied to many once-powerful people, the most famous perhaps being Al Capone. Capone was responsible for many murders when he terrorised Chicago in the 1920s, but he was prosecuted and jailed merely for not paying income tax. Suharto was in charge of Indonesia when many thousands of Indonesians died in a pogrom against communists in the 1960s; and thousands more people were killed later during the occupation of East Timor. But when the trial of Mr Suharto opened in Jakarta on August 31st he was accused of being a thief, not a killer. The prosecution says he ...