KEY POINTS:
New evidence claiming that a New Zealander and four other newsmen were executed by Indonesian troops in 1975 while working for Australian media is hearsay and may not be accepted in court, says an Indonesia expert.
Lawyer George Brownbill has contradicted the official line that the five were
killed inadvertently by crossfire while reporting on Indonesia's invasion of East Timor.
Mr Brownbill said that in 1977 he was shown an Australian intelligence report of monitored Indonesian military communications in which a senior Indonesian officer said the five had been shot in accordance with instructions.
Neither the original intelligence report nor the Indonesian language intercepts have been found.
Indonesia expert and University of New South Wales Professor John Ingleson said yesterday that it had been known for 20-25 years that the journalists died in highly suspicious circumstances.
Many believed the evidence pointed to cold-blooded murder.
"The idea that the journalists were killed by the Indonesian military is not new, nor is the notion that the Defence Signals organisation were actually monitoring the signals within the [Indonesian] military at the time," he told Sky News.
"The difficulty is going to be people saying they have seen a document - which is hearsay - and actually being able to table in a court the original documentation in Indonesian and the translation so it can be checked.
"It's highly unlikely that actual evidence a court will accept will be found. After 31 years it's highly unlikely, highly improbable, that the Indonesians themselves will re-open the case."
News Ltd yesterday reported that Mr Brownbill's statement would be tabled in the inquest into the deaths of the five in the NSW Coroners Court next year.
Mr Brownbill had been secretary to the Hope Royal Commission into the intelligence services which visited the Shoal Bay monitoring station of the Defence Signals Directorate in 1977.
There, a young official showed him and royal commission investigator Ian Cunliffe the intelligence report. His statement to the inquest is based on his recollection of that report. It's unclear whether the original still exists.
Nine Network cameraman Brian Peters, 29, and reporter Malcolm Rennie, 28, Seven Network reporter Greg Shackleton, 27, New Zealand cameraman Gary Cunningham, 27, and sound recordist Tony Stewart, 21, all died at Balibo on October 16, 1975.
- AAP
