Corruption claims revealed by WikiLeaks will not be investigated

JAKARTA: Indonesia's independent anti-corruption watchdog will not inquire into allegations in US diplomatic cables that the President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, was implicated in corruption.
The stance of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) was backed by the leading anti-graft non-government organisation, Indonesia Corruption Watch.
A small group of protesters held a demonstration at the US embassy yesterday, tearing up copies of the Herald and The Age and demanding an apology.

Advertisement: Story continues below

Another small group called the Association of Advocates for People launched a legal action in a central Jakarta court against the US government and both papers. The application, signed by four people, was seeking damages of $US1 billion.
The news portal Detik.com said a politician from Dr Yudhoyono's political party, Amir Syamsuddin, dismissed the lawsuit as ''theatre'' and counter-productive.
The cables, revealed in the Herald after being obtained from the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks, detailed allegations that Dr Yudhoyono had spied on political rivals, quashed a corruption inquiry and received funding from the businessman Tomy Winata via a middleman.
Dr Yudhoyono has denied all the allegations. The KPK said the unsubstantiated nature of the claims, which were largely accounts of conversations between US diplomats and Indonesian political and intelligence figures, did not meet its threshold to launch an inquiry.
''The KPK needs hard documents or detailed information like who met whom, where, when,'' a spokesman said. ''The contents [of the cables] are only about loose information.''
The deputy co-ordinator of Indonesian Corruption Watch, Emerson Yuntho, said it would not be launching an inquiry, and there were clear errors in some of the diplomatic cables.
The government has said that the allegation that Dr Yudhoyono ordered Hendarman Supandji in 2004 to abandon a corruption inquiry into a political powerbroker, Taufik Kiemas, did not make sense as Mr Supandji was not assistant attorney-general at the time, as stated in the cables.
Mr Emerson said Mr Taufik was not involved in projects, including a toll road, alleged in the cables.
Mr Winata, named in the cables as the man who was funnelling funds to Dr Yudhoyono, has issued a denial.
Meanwhile, a police officer has lost an arm and three others have been injured after a bomb meant for a high-ranking member of Dr Yudhoyono's party exploded at an office in East Jakarta.
The bomb, which detonated about 4.10pm local time yesterday, was in a package addressed to Ulil Abshar Abdalla, a moderate Muslim scholar and the founder of the group, Jaringan Islam Liberal.