President Suharto of Indonesia resigns following the killing of students from Trisakti University earlier that week by security forces and growing mass protests in Jakarta against his ongoing corrupt rule.

Suharto was an Indonesian military general, politician and dictator who served as the country's second and longest-serving president from 1967 to 1998. Rising to prominence amid political turmoil and anti-communist purges in the mid-1960s, Suharto gradually sidelined Sukarno and formally assumed the presidency after MPRS force Sukarno, to resign. His three-decade rule, characterised as authoritarian and kleptocratic, was marked by widespread corruption, political repression, and human rights abuses. Suharto's regime ultimately collapsed in 1998 amid mass protests, violent unrest, and the fallout of the 1997 Asian financial crisis, leading to his resignation.

Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian and Pacific oceans. Comprising over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guinea, Indonesia is the world's largest archipelagic state and the 14th-largest country by area, at 1,904,569 square kilometres. With over 280 million people, Indonesia is the world's fourth-most-populous country and the most populous Muslim-majority country. Java, the world's most populous island, is home to more than half of the country's population.

The Trisakti shootings, also known as the Trisakti tragedy, took place at Trisakti University, Jakarta, Indonesia, on 12 May 1998. At a demonstration demanding President Suharto's resignation, Indonesian Army soldiers opened fire on unarmed protestors. Four students, Elang Mulia Lesmana, Heri Hertanto, Hafidin Royan, and Hendriawan Sie, were killed and dozens more were injured. The shootings triggered a riot and nationwide revolutionary wave, leading to Suharto's resignation later the same month.

Jakarta, officially the Special Capital Region of Jakarta and formerly known as Batavia until 1949, is the capital and largest city of Indonesia and an autonomous region at the provincial level. Lying on the northwest coast of Java, the world's most populous island, Jakarta is the largest metropole in Southeast Asia and serves as the diplomatic capital of ASEAN. The Special Region has a status equivalent to that of a province and is bordered by the province of West Java to the south and east and Banten to the west. Its coastline faces the Java Sea to the north, and it shares a maritime border with Lampung to the west. Jakarta's metropolitan area is ASEAN's second largest economy after Singapore. In 2023, the city's GDP PPP was estimated at US$724.010 billion.