YOGYAKARTA, Indonesia, April 1 (Reuters) – Indonesia has called on the United Nations to investigate the the deaths of three of its UNIFIL peacekeepers following Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon, a foreign ministry official said on Wednesday as relatives at home mourned their deaths.
The ministry’s U.N. representative, Umar Hadi, called for the inquiry in a statement during an emergency meeting of the Security Council on Tuesday.
“We demand a direct investigation from the U.N., not just Israel’s excuses,” he said.
Indonesia said earlier this week that ongoing Israeli military operations have placed U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon at grave risk.
The Indonesian peacekeepers were killed in two separate incidents in southern Lebanon after a bloody weekend in which Lebanese journalists and medics were also killed in Israeli strikes.
PEACEKEEPER’S RELATIVES MOURN
One of the peacekeeping troops, Farizal Rhomadhon, 28, was killed in an attack on Sunday. He is survived by a wife and one child, local media reported.
In his village in the city of Yogyakarta, his uncle Sumijan, 82, attended a family gathering on Wednesday to pay his respects, though he said his nephew’s body had not yet been returned to Indonesia.
“The kid was obedient, hard-working,” he told Reuters. “Before he was a soldier, he was in the business of selling songbirds. He was very disciplined.”
Indonesian foreign ministry’s initial reaction to Farizal’s death on Monday drew criticism on social media, with many users complaining that it did not identify the cause of the attack, describing it as “indirect artillery fire”.
UN INVESTIGATION BLAMES ROADSIDE EXPLOSION
A roadside explosion appeared to strike the convoy of two Indonesian peacekeepers killed in southern Lebanon on Monday, U.N. peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix said on Tuesday, citing the initial findings of an investigation.
The Israeli military said on Tuesday that its review of an incident involving UNIFIL troops on Monday concluded that Israeli troops had not placed any explosive device in the area and had deployed no troops there.
Indonesia contributes over 2,700 uniformed personnel to U.N. peacekeeping, among the largest contributors globally, the U.N. said in 2024.
Indonesia has pledged to contribute troops for potential deployment in Gaza as part of the U.N.-mandated multinational International Stabilization Force.
(Reporting by Budi Satriawan in Yogyakarta and Stanley Widianto; Editing by David Stanway)
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