JAKARTA, Indonesia – A teenager received a suspended jail
sentence for posting insulting comments on a romantic rival's
Facebook page, the latest case bringing Indonesia's tough
defamation laws under criticism.
Farah Nur Arafah, 18, was convicted Tuesday by three District
Court judges in the town of Bogor, 35 miles (60 kilometers) south
of Jakarta, of defaming her 18-year-old Facebook friend Felly
Fandini. Arafah feared Fandini was attempting to sour the
relationship with her boyfriend.
Arahaf's posting in July last year called Fandini a pig and a
dog, as well as saying she was promiscuous and overweight.
Presiding judge Ekofa Rahayu sentenced her to 75 days in prison,
but suspended the sentence because Arafah cooperated during her
trial. She must serve the sentence if she breaks the law in the
next five months.
Arafah said her brush with the law had not put her off Facebook.
"But I'll be more careful about what comments I post," she told The
Jakarta Post newspaper.
Arafah's defamation case was the latest involving social
networking Web sites.
A group of reporters recently complained to police when
Indonesian actress Luna Maya Twittered that tabloid journalists
were worse than prostitutes and murderers. Police did not press
charges.
A mother of two young children, Prita Mulyasari, became a
national symbol for the plight of the powerless in Indonesia when
she was sued by a hospital and spent three weeks in jail last year
because she complained on Facebook that her mumps had been
misdiagnosed. She has countersued.
Andreas Harsono, consultant for Human Rights Watch, said
Wednesday the New York-based watchdog would release a report next
month showing that Indonesia's criminal defamation laws were among
the world's toughest.
Since the fall of the Suharto dictatorship in 1998, the penalty
for defamation has been reduced from death to life in prison,
Harsono said.
But now the number of defamation cases under civil and criminal
statutes has increased as a means of protecting the powerful and
corrupt from criticism, he said.
"It is an electoral democracy, but there are no civil
liberties," Harsono said.
A Facebook spokesman could not be immediately contacted for
comment Wednesday.
Charges relating to Facebook posts are not uncommon. Earlier
this month a teenager in the U.S. state of Illinois was charged
with two counts of harassment through electronic communication, and
a Florida woman was jailed for making threats on the Web site.
--AP