Indonesia: media worker sentenced to jail for covering land dispute (Update)
Event- Country
- Indonesia
- Initial Date
- Aug 10, 2020
- Event Description
Diananta Putra Sumedi, a former chief editor of online local media banjarhits.id, was found guilty and sentenced to three months 15 days for his reporting of a land dispute. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its affiliate the Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) Indonesia express dismay over the conviction and call on authorities to stop criminalising journalists.
The panel of judges lead by Meir Elisabeth at the hearing in Kotabaru District Court, South Kalimantan on August 10 said that Diananta was guilty of inciting hatred and breaching the code of journalism ethics. The judges ruled he violated the article of 28 of the Information and Electronic Transactions Law (ITE Law).
Diananta was arrested by the special crimes investigation directorate of South Kalimantan despite the Indonesian Press Council resolving the dispute in January, 2020. He published an article on a land conflict entitled Johnlin seizes land, Dayak complains to the South Kalimantan Police on November 9, 2019 in banjarhits.id, a partner of national news media Kumparan. Sukirman from a Dayak community council filed a report against Diananta after the publication of the article. Although the dispute has been resolved through mediation process in the Press Council, the trial of Diananta still continued.
Criminalisation of journalists is an ongoing violation against journalists in Indonesia. Despite the fact that the police have signed a memorandum of understanding with the Indonesian Press Council to settle legal disputes, journalists are still being dragged before the courts.
Speaking to the reporters after the trial, Diananta said that the conviction is a very bad precedent for press freedom in Indonesia.
- Impact of Event
- 1
- Gender of HRD
- Man
- Violation
- (Arbitrary) Arrest and Detention
- Denial Fair Trial
- Judicial Harassment
- Rights Concerned
- Online
- Right to fair trial
- Right to liberty and security
- HRD
- Media Worker
- Perpetrator-State
- Judiciary
- Source
- Monitoring Status
- Pending
- Event Location
Latitude: -3.3167562134640796
Longitude: 115.90179524035514
- Event Location
- Summary for Publications
On 10 August 2020, Diananta Putra Sumedi, media worker, was sentenced to jail for covering land dispute by a court in Kotabaru Regency, Indonesia.