Open Letter - A Cry For Help

An Open Letter To The Citizens Of The World

hgouw@iname.com - H. Gouw
The Victims and Their Families in Jakarta, July 20, 1998

I'm one of the many Chinese girls who live in fear in Indonesia, exactly Jakarta.

I don't know where I should go, to whom I should ask for help. not to Indonesian government because I don't see any anticipation from the government to overcome the situation. Many Chinese girls still are raped even now so long after the 13 & 14 May riots.

Nowadays, I myself heard issues that the natives are going to have AMOY PARTY starting 17 July. - a party to rape especially Chinese girls. I heard that there are some people who ride in taxis, when they pay the taxi fare. The driver will not take their money. They just say just wait and see that you, Chinese will pay later. This is some kind of threat.

We don't deserve to take this kind of living. We are human being, not the place for them to take revenge.

If you care about our life here, please help us to do something. tell UNO to take action upon Indonesia government to give back our free life, free of being scared living in our own country.

We are ordinary people, we are not in politics, we don't have money to run away from this country. Should we let our destiny here end like this?

We do really need your help. Once again only you cand help us.

PS : Lots and lots of Chinese girls need your help here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

On May 13th and 14th, there were organized riots targeted deliberately against the Chinese in Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia. Homes and business buildings were set on fire, stores looted, and many women, aged ten through sixties, were raped. Some of them were gang raped right in front of cheering crowds. Some suffered further bodily harm in their private parts as a result of struggling against them, some were tossed into fires and left to die.

During that horrible 48-hour period, the Indonesian authorities did little to protect the Chinese or to control the mobs. Adding to the insults of those terrible tragedies, some government officials and community leaders even blamed the Chinese themselves. It makes one wonder if the government instigated the riots.

In this age, how did the international community every where, who advocate human rights, fail to take notice of these gross human rights violations against the Chinese minority in Indonesia?

According to a survey made by rescue organizations, there were more than 300 women and girls raped in Jakarta alone, and more than a thousand elsewhere throughout the country during these two days of rampage.

The Chinese did not dare to protest on the street for fear of a return of the 1967 anti-Chinese riots that caused tens of thousands of deaths and a huge loss of personal property. We Chinese, most of whom have lived in Indonesia for generations, without political power or even voice, have been forced to suffer great human indignity in silence.

We are counting on the international communities to spread the news of our sufferings, and bring our voices to let other peoples know how the Indonesian government has failed to protect the human rights and properties of its minorities.

We earnestly hope that you, the citizens of the world, will contact the Indonesian embassies in your countries to protest loudly in our behalf.

We are in gratitude for whatever you can do to deliver us from this intolerable sufferance.