A Suspect Cartoon
The summons came as a surprise to Meidyatama Suryodiningrat, editor-in-chief of English-language daily The Jakarta Post. He had just presided over a meeting when he received the letter with the insignia of the Jakarta Police on Tuesday two weeks ago. The letter told him to meet up with a police investigator and stated that he was suspected of a crime. "How could this be?" Meidyatama remembers thinking at the time.
The police had named Meidyatama a suspect in a religious defamation case. This was related to a caricature about the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) that the daily had carried on July 3. Two days after the cartoon was published, Jakarta Police spokesman Senior Commissioner Rikwanto announced Meidyatama's status as a suspect. According to Rikwanto, Meidyatama was being charged under Article 156a of the Criminal Code, which carried a maximum sentence of five years imprisonment.
December 23, 2014
The summons came as a surprise to Meidyatama Suryodiningrat, editor-in-chief of English-language daily The Jakarta Post. He had just presided over a meeting when he received the letter with the insignia of the Jakarta Police on Tuesday two weeks ago. The letter told him to meet up with a police investigator and stated that he was suspected of a crime. "How could this be?" Meidyatama remembers thinking at the time.
The police had named Meidyatama a
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