JAKARTA (Reuters) – Press freedom groups have called on Indonesian authorities to investigate what they called acts of intimidation against a magazine known for its hard-hitting investigative reporting, after it was twice sent mutilated animal carcasses last week.
Tempo Magazine, a publication that was twice banned when Indonesia was under authoritarian rule decades ago, was sent a pig’s head on Wednesday and six headless rats three days later, it said on Monday.
It is not immediately clear who sent the packages and Tempo said they came without messages or claims of responsibility.
“This terror act is terrifying,” its deputy editor-in-chief Bagja Hidayat told Reuters. “This message isn’t just for Tempo but all reporters in Indonesia.”
Bagja said Tempo received a message on its Instagram account after receiving the pig’s head, which said “terror” would not stop.
Editor-in-chief Setri Yasra said the incidents had been reported to Indonesia’s main human rights body, but Tempo did not suspect any specific organisation of sending the packages as it published critical investigations every week.
Press freedom and rights groups, including Amnesty International and the Alliance of Independent Journalists, decried the act and called for a police investigation.
The national police did not immediately respond on Monday to a request for comment. On Sunday, a senior police official was quoted by media as saying they were investigating the incidents.
Beh Lih Yi, Asia program coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, said Tempo was the victim of a deliberate act of intimidation.
“Tempo is well known internationally for its fiercely independent reporting, using this playbook from autocrats elsewhere simply will not work,” she said in a statement, urging President Prabowo Subianto to condemn the act and uphold press freedom.
The government remained committed to press freedom and there was no media censorship in Indonesia, said Hasan Nasbi, a spokesperson for Prabowo’s office.
Hasan had last week said Tempo should cook the pig’s head, a remark that drew ire on social media for its perceived insensitivity.
(This story has been refiled to fix a typo in the word ‘drew,’ in paragraph 12)
(Reporting by Stanley Widianto and Ananda Teresia; Editing by Martin Petty)
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