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[27 September 2007] - Indonesia's National Commission on Child Protection has asked the police not to discriminate on financial grounds when investigating cases of child abduction. The missing daughter of a businessman was returned home in just nine days, while it took eight months for the daughter of a street vendor to be returned to her parents, commission secretary-general Arist Merdeka Sirait told a media briefing recently. "The police must give equal treatment to child kidnapping victims, from both poor and wealthy families," he said. Arist said the investigation to find Melyaningsih, the four-year-old daughter of a street vendor, was too slow. "Actually, the police only needed two weeks to get her back but they did not start investigating immediately after the case was reported," he said. Melyaningsih, known as Mely by her family, was kidnapped on 8 January while she was with her father, who was selling traditional medicines at Depok Baru train station. A witness who was also a street vendor told Mely's father, Muhamad Melody Nur, 52, that he saw a woman talking to Mely and offering her food. Nur reported the abduction to a police post at the Depok Baru train station the next day and filed another report with Depok Police two days later, although he did not provide them with a photograph at the time. Photograph found "I was panicking and I forgot that I had her picture. I did find her photograph a few months later." On 11 August Nur reported his missing daughter to the commission, which then sent letters asking for a report on the progress of the case to Depok Police head Sr. Comr. Imam Pramukarno and Jakarta Police chief Insp. Gen. Adang Firman. Arist said that it was only on 29 August, almost eight months after the girl had gone missing, that the police set up an investigation team. The alleged kidnapper, a 34-year-old homeless woman name Suprihati, was arrested just a few days later in front of Depok Town Square. Arist said the police often blamed a lack of information for slow investigations. "The police should have understood the psychology of the case, that child kidnapper at least would have approached or talked to the victim before the abduction took place," he said. "It's not the time to debate the number of kidnapping cases, whether it's increasing or decreasing. Our commission can't solve these cases alone. That's why we need to cooperate with the National Police." Spate of kidnappings So far this year, the commission has received reports of 56 kidnappings of children under the age of 12, from Greater Jakarta, West Java and Banten. In 34 of the cases, the kidnappers asked for ransoms ranging from Rp 20 million to Rp 1 billion. Eleven cases involved the children being forced to work on the streets or in entertainment centers, four saw the children placed in forced sexual work and the rest were adopted illegally. National Police spokesman Insp. Gen. Sisno Adiwinoto said each case was unique and needed special treatment. "It's a coincidence if one case was solved faster maybe because there was more information supplied to us. But there's no discrimination at all," he said. "Anyone calling us discriminatory should walk in our shoes for a day to see the sort of problems we face." Further information
pdf: http://www.thejakartapost.com/yesterdaydetail.asp?fileid=20070919.A03