Last chances for history and a call for assistance
Annie Pohlman
This special issue of Inside Indonesia commemorates the 60th anniversary of the beginning of the 1965–1966 genocide, when an estimated half a million men, women and children were murdered for their real or perceived support of the Indonesian Communist Party (Partai Komunis Indonesia, PKI). The contributors to this special issue are all members of an international team that has come together to record the testimonies and archives of survivors and eyewitnesses to the genocide before it is too late. The youngest survivors were children in 1965; there are only a few years left in which to record their life stories. Called the Indonesia Trauma Testimony Project (ITTP), this team aims to preserve these testimonial materials in perpetuity, as an enduring record of this dark chapter in Indonesian and world history.
The materials that the ITTP seeks to preserve are the collections of testimonies and documentation amassed by survivor communities after the New Order regime fell in 1998—held by aging custodians, often in secret—and which now face imminent loss, with some critical collections already destroyed (through environmental damage and poor preservation, some having been destroyed by family members too afraid to retain them). Without intervention, most of these surviving materials will be lost within the coming decade.
This urgent project involves the work of Indonesian and international researchers, seven regional fieldwork teams spread across Indonesia, a team of transcribers, a team of archivists, an advisory board, and the input and support of more than 20 survivor groups and human rights NGOs. The articles in this special issue, we hope, will give readers insight into the joys and challenges of the ITTP’s work; our aim with this special issue was to explain how the project is working, to highlight some of the findings, and to showcase some of the work of our outstanding team of dedicated researchers. Specific details of locations and activities have been excluded in the interest of maintaining the safety and security of the workers while the project is underway.
The need to preserve memories of 1965
The first three articles of the special issue explain the pressing need to preserve survivor and eyewitness accounts of the 1965 genocide. It begins with the contribution by the ITTP’s Indonesia-based lead researcher, Sri Lestari Wahyuningroem. She explains how preserving archives of survivors’ experiences is an act of resistance against the state’s ongoing oppression and historical erasure. These archives safeguard truth, amplify silenced voices, and uphold the dignity of victims. They provide evidence for accountability, may support future justice efforts, and ensure collective memory endures despite ongoing denial and repression. As Wahyuningroem also explains, however, there are significant challenges to preserving archives related to the 1965 genocide. Survivor organisations and civil society groups have long documented victims’ testimonies and materials, yet poor preservation, political sensitivity, and resource constraints threaten these vital records.
The researchers recruited to the ITTP to undertake this work of preserving these threatened records all have a long history of involvement with the 1965 survivor community. Many, such as Andreas Iswinarto, have strong backgrounds in conducting research into and documenting the mass killings. Iswinarto himself has compiled what should rightly be understood as the most comprehensive collection of 1965-related materials to date: the 1965–1966 Online Genocide Library (Perpustakaan Online Genosida 1965-1966, POG 1965-1966). As he explains the POG 1965-1966 challenges Indonesia’s official history by preserving survivor testimonies, literature, and art on the massacres. It strengthens counter-narratives, documents erased leftist histories, with the intention of fostering solidarity with survivor communities. As Iswinarto explains, this online library seeks to connect people with information in the digital era, particularly by empowering younger generations to engage critically with the past, and to resist state propaganda and historical erasure.
Saskia Wieringa’s article gives the broader context for the ITTP’s work, which is the ongoing denial of the 1965 genocide. In her discussion, Wieringa examines the various strategies that have been used over time to deny the genocide by successive regimes since 1965. She highlights evidence that supports Suharto’s complicity and foreknowledge of the 30 September Movement’s actions, the army’s distortions of the alleged events of the coup, and propaganda demonising victims. She emphasises how these various denial strategies have created enduring infrastructures of impunity that perpetuate silence, historical distortion, and support ongoing military abuses.
Collecting stories of 1965
The remaining five articles are all contributions from the ITTP’s field researchers. These articles speak to the process of collecting endangered archives and interviewing survivors and eyewitnesses to the 1965 genocide, and to some of their findings. The article by Bimo Bagas Basworo highlights the work being undertaken by one of the regional field teams in Java. He begins with the current government’s plans to rewrite history, provoking fears of renewed erasure and persecution amongst survivor communities, and his colleagues’ motivations for their involvement in the ITTP. Some of his colleagues come from families deeply affected by the mass violence of 1965, while others were drawn to this work through their interest in human rights. Despite the challenges they face in documenting stories of terrible violence, all members of the regional team’s field researchers articulated the need to preserve survivor memories and to engage younger generations in remembering the genocide.
Martha Bire’s article turns to the work of another of the regional teams, highlighting grassroots initiatives in East Nusa Tenggara to preserve testimonies and to build a memorial to commemorate the 1965 genocide. Bire, like many of the ITTP’s field researchers, has long been engaged with community-led initiatives aimed at investigating 1965 and promoting reconciliation. For Bire, these efforts are part of developing a 'history from below' of the mass violence, as well as her personal commitment to truth-telling and a form of theology rooted in social justice.
Over the past eighteen months, the field researchers have uncovered new insights into the dynamics of the mass violence. In his article, Quadi Azam, highlights some of those findings from his team’s work in Sumatra. Based on interviews with elderly survivors, Azam discusses new findings on forced labour: how land was seized from Communist supporters and prisoners forced to work in various plantations and other labour sites. These findings bring to light new details of the exploitative plantation work, harsh conditions in these detention sites, the deaths from starvation, systemic land loss, and the lasting trauma of survivors.
ITTP project officer and field researcher Sekar Ayu’s contribution focuses on the life story of one of the ITTP’s participants, Ibu Manismar, a life-long activist from Sumatra. Manismar, one of tens of thousands of women targeted for her involvement in the progressive women’s organisation, Gerwani (Indonesian Women’s Movement), endured 12 years of imprisonment during the anti-communist purges, raising her infant daughter in prison. Tortured and widowed, she survived immense trauma. Now elderly, Manismar remains committed to preserving the memory of comrades lost and to sustained grassroots social activism despite state oppression.
The final piece in this special issue is a photographic essay by artist and field researcher Rangga Purbaya. Entitled The Silent Survivors, the essay shows photographs discovered by chance at a road-side stall, believed to be victims of the 1965-1966 genocide. Purbaya’s work attempts to put a face to the many unknown and unnamed victims of the mass killings.
A request to communities and scholars
For now, the ITTP is focused on collecting and preserving what we can in Indonesia: we will only stop when our funding runs out (likely end-2026). The work of the ITTP, however, must continue, as there are many more materials relating to 1965 that need preservation. For this reason, the ITTP is seeking your support for a subsequent round of collecting, beginning in late 2026.
If you hold materials related to the 1965-1966 genocide—particularly testimonial or other first-hand materials—we want you to donate a digital copy of these materials to the ITTP archive. Please understand that careful documentation and description of your materials is necessary before they can be added to the archive. Wherever possible, we need to know the provenance of testimonial artefacts – where did they come from? Who created them? When and why? The project’s archiving protocols allows for anonymity of sources, when requested. If you are interested, please contact the project for more details: ittp@anu.edu.au.
The ITTP is also seeking volunteers! If you are able to donate your time, we will be recruiting volunteers from late 2026 to assist with these secondary archival tasks. Historians, librarians, archivists and anyone with time to donate, we want you! If you are interested, please contact the project: ittp@anu.edu.au.
Annie Pohlman teaches Indonesian at The University of Queensland, in Brisbane, Australia. She is the coordinator of the Indonesia Trauma Testimony Project (ITTP).
