Indonesian students chant anti-government slogans from the hood of a police car Tuesday. (Reuters)

By Cindy Shiner
Special to The Washington Post
Wednesday, May 13, 1998; Page A01

JAKARTA, Indonesia, May 12—Police opened fire on thousands of anti-government demonstrators at a Jakarta university today, killing six and wounding more than a dozen others in the bloodiest outbreak of violence yet in Indonesia's growing political crisis.

Witnesses said police fired down from an overpass for several minutes on protesters at the prestigious Trisakti University, inflicting the first student deaths in nearly three months of demonstrations at campuses across the country calling for an end to the authoritarian government of President Suharto.

Weeping students gathered outside the morgue at Jakarta's Sumber Waras hospital, where officials said four corpses with gunshot wounds had been taken, the Reuters news service reported. Police and military officials later confirmed that six people had died in the melee and that at least 16 had been wounded.

Jakarta Police Chief Hamani Nata said that police at the scene -- as at previous protest rallies -- had been issued only plastic bullets, but a news photographer at a hospital treating casualties said he saw a metal bullet that had been extracted from the head of one victim. An emergency room official at the same hospital said the victims there "had been shot in the head and back." An assistant rector at the university, a private Christian institution, said other students and some journalists had been injured less seriously by gunfire, police truncheons and errant stones hurled by protesters.

In Washington, Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright said in a statement that the United States deplores the killings, and for the first time called publicly for political reform in Indonesia. Albright reiterated previous U.S. exhortations for restraint in dealing with protesters, but in a shift in approach toward the Suharto government, she added: "All parties in Indonesia recognize the need for political reform. Such political reform can only be achieved through dialogue between the Indonesian government and its citizens."

Administration officials said this does not mean the United States is trying to push Suharto from office or that it is seeking to force any particular political solution on the country. But they said the administration has come to the view that Indonesia stands little chance of implementing economic austerity measures required of it in exchange for an International Monetary Fund financial bailout unless its citizens have a greater voice in the nation's affairs.

Up to 5,000 students participated in today's demonstration, breaking through a university fence and tying up traffic on a main road in defiance of a ban on street protests. Witnesses said police opened fire after some of the protesters roughed up a suspected undercover intelligence agent, many of whom roam universities and report on student activities.

Police also dispersed a student protest at Bandung University, 75 miles east of Jakarta, firing into the air and clubbing demonstrators, five of whom were injured. "Stop the violence," one student yelled at the rally as a soldier struck him repeatedly over the head, the Associated Press reported. Other students chanted "Suharto should be toppled!" and sang the national anthem. In Kupang, 1,100 miles east of the capital, at least two students were injured when police fired tear gas and plastic bullets at a crowd of 300 as they shouted: "Democracy is dead!"

Although the government banned political meetings at universities in 1978, students across the country have managed for nearly three months to organize daily protests that call into question the legitimacy of Suharto, Asia's longest-serving ruler. The crisis was triggered by the collapse late last year of Indonesia's currency and once-booming economy, which forced Suharto to seek a $43 billion IMF loan and to impose tough economic austerity measures as a condition of that loan.

After presiding for decades over a government characterized by cronyism and patronage that has made his family and inner circle enormously wealthy, Suharto's response to IMF loan requirements has been halting. At the same time, Indonesians have responded with resentment whenever Suharto has resisted enforcing IMF conditions -- thus placing the country's economic recovery in peril -- or when he has adopted austerity measures that lower living standards for workers.

Last week, for example, the government ended subsidies for fuel and public transport, prompting immediate demonstrations and rioting in a number of cities that claimed at least three lives as police fired live ammunition into crowds. Throughout the growing crisis, security forces had repeatedly warned they would use harsh measures to deal with demonstrations that got out of hand.

Suharto himself called for calm this weekend before leaving Jakarta for a summit of developing nations in Cairo, and on Monday he exhorted Indonesians to make "painful sacrifices and summon our reserves of endurance and social discipline." The current political and economic crisis is the country's deepest since the 76-year-old leader came to power more than 30 years ago.

The collapse of the currency, the rupiah, has left most businesses at least technically bankrupt, manufacturing virtually stalled and more than 8 million people unemployed. Spurred by economic hardship, popular sentiment has begun to coincide with some of the students' calls for reform, and in Jakarta today members of an unofficial labor union marched on the Jakarta offices of the IMF, calling for a delay of scheduled loan installments to Indonesia under its bailout program.

It is unclear how today's deaths may affect international support for the bailout. Western nations have warned the Suharto government repeatedly against using violence against protesters, and members of the U.S. Congress have expressed concern about lending money to Indonesia following mounting reports of human rights abuses here.

Albright's statement reflects the difficult balancing act the administration has tried to follow in its Indonesia policy -- seeking to restore stability to the country without appearing to go too far toward propping up the Suharto regime. Indonesia is the world's fourth-most populous nation, straddling vital Asian sea lanes, and Washington has been worried for months that an upheaval there could disrupt global commerce and threaten the nascent economic recoveries in neighboring Asian countries.

Asked if the United States would seek to cut off IMF funding for Indonesia if the violence grows or if the political system remains unchanged, an administration official declined to respond. "We're just going to keep looking at what we think is best for the Indonesian people, in terms of what best contributes to enduring stability to the country as a whole going forward," he said.

Reflecting administration concerns that a cutoff of international aid would only condemn Indonesia to a deepening economic crisis and more violence, he added: "It's not clear that a strategy of inducing more economic instability would be an effective strategy to achieving a favorable outcome."

Last week, the United States suspended joint training exercises with the Indonesian military, wary of being accused of lending support to security forces here at a time when they are using repressive measures to put down democracy demonstrations.

Staff writer Paul Blustein in Washington contributed to this report.