FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — Impunity and the ability of the well connected to flout laws and do as they like is a subject that Southeast Asian governments wish would just go away. It undermines democracy and that old chestnut the separation of powers, a foundation of democratic principles.

Governments spend fortunes on public relations trying to convince people that the problem is merely a figment of critics’ imagination, parlayed by a media that simply doesn’t understand the true values and characteristics that are the making of their grand societies. Then along comes Kopassus.

Read more from Luke Hunt at The Diplomat.