Aceh

Jakarta, GAM must resume Aceh peace talks: Hamzah

Jakarta Post - April 27, 2003

Jakarta/Banda Aceh -- Vice President Hamzah Haz called on the government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) on Saturday to resume peace talks to save the peace agreement signed in December 2002.

He also suggested that the meeting, which the government had requested to discuss violations to the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (COHA) signed last December, be held in Indonesia.

"GAM and the Indonesian government must cool down first," Hamzah was quoted by detik.com as saying in Pasuruan, East Java on Saturday. "If possible, we should negotiate in this country," Hamzah said.

The government decided to withdraw from a long-awaited Joint Council meeting after the rebels insisted on holding it on April 27 instead of 25, as it had previously suggested.

President Megawati Soekarnoputri, who is currently in Poland, the last leg of her three-nation tour that also took her to Romania and Russia, said on Saturday that she had ordered the withdrawal from the meeting.

"I received reports directly from Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs [Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono]. I said 'disperse' [stop the negotiations]," Megawati was quoted by Antara as saying in Warsaw, Poland, on Saturday.

"We shall collect all information, including that from former foreign affairs minister [Ali] Alatas as special envoy to Sweden and shall decide the next steps," Megawati said.

Hamzah ruled out any military operation in the near future, stressing that there were still many ways to resolve the Aceh situation peacefully. "What is clear is that the government will not rush into military operations. Even a fugitive is not shot immediately, but given warning shots: one, two, and three. So, the road is still very long," Hamzah said.

The Henry Dunant Centre (HDC), which brokered the peace agreement signed in December 2002, said on Thursday it was seeking new dates for the meeting.

The government and GAM agreed in December to end hostilities in the province, where over 10,000 people, mostly civilians, had been killed.

GAM, which has been fighting for independence for resource-rich Aceh since 1976, accepted the special autonomy arrangement for Aceh and agreed to lay down its arms. The government, for its part, agreed to stop all military operations there and reposition troops from offensive to defensive positions. Both sides, however, failed to comply with the accord and the April 25 meeting was seen as the last hope of saving the agreement, to end the 26-year conflict.

Meanwhile, police in Aceh have tightened security in the province as violence worsened, with the capital, Banda Aceh, increasingly deserted in the evenings.

Banda Aceh Police chief Adj. Comm. Sr. Alfons T. said on Saturday the police had increased security measures for members and offices of the Joint Security Committee (JSC), including those of GAM and HDC, as well as vital installations, such as PT Telkom, PT PLN, banks and markets.

"Police officers have been instructed to step up security for offices, houses and members of JSC and HCD in Banda Aceh," Alfons said.

On Friday, troops said they shot dead three separatists in Aceh during a skirmish in the Alue Raya area of South Aceh. Local military spokesman Maj. Eddi Fernandi said the encounter took place while soldiers were carrying out a "security operation" in the area. Troops found a handgun at the scene. No immediate confirmation from GAM was available.

US, Japan blame Aceh rebels for cancellation of meeting

Jakarta Post - April 26, 2003

Banda Aceh -- The United States and other powers expressed "deep disappointment" on Friday at the scrapping of a crucial meeting aimed at saving the Aceh peace pact and put the blame on separatist rebels. The US, Japan and the World Bank said a successful Joint Council meeting would be necessary to save the December 9 peace agreement in the Indonesianprovince.

"We regret that the Free Aceh Movement [GAM] has allowed minor procedural issues to prevent the parties from meeting," they said in a statement. "We call upon GAM to maintain the path for a peaceful solution of the Aceh conflict," AFP reported.

This weekend's meeting in Geneva of the Joint Council -- grouping government and rebel leaders and foreign mediators -- was scrapped after the government announced Thursday evening it was pulling out.

The statement urged both sides to reschedule the meeting as soon as possible. "For the sake of keeping the [peace] process alive, we hope the parties will put the interests of the people of Aceh to live in peace and security above any other interests."

Jakarta set to start Aceh military action

Straits Times - April 26, 2003

Devi Asmarani, Jakarta -- The Indonesian government said it had lost all faith in the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) after the rebel group "disrespectfully" postponed an emergency meeting that was to salvage a peace pact between them.

In a response seen as an overreaction by some, the Indonesian government signalled strongly that it was stopping talks and starting military operations in the province.

A day after Jakarta rejected the GAM-proposed postponement of the Joint Council meeting, an emergency Cabinet session was held and options to deal with Aceh discussed, officials said. One of the options included rescheduling the meeting.

But on the ground, it appeared Indonesia had grown weary of talks and was slowly switching to the military option. Some 26,000 troops stationed in Aceh were put on red alert in anticipation of military operations. More troops and combat equipment were headed for the province, an intelligence source told The Straits Times.

Also, the Indonesian police said its elite Mobile Brigade -- which had been functioning as a regular police unit to help Aceh's demilitarisation process -- would go back to its combat role, a violation of the peace pact.

The Geneva meeting that was to have been held yesterday and mediated by international organisation Henry Dunant Centre (HDC) was to help restore the Cessation of Hostility Agreement, which the two parties had signed in December. The agreement had so far failed to bring peace to Aceh, with both parties blaming each other for violations.

Just before the departure of Indonesian officials for Geneva, HDC announced that the meeting had to be postponed to tomorrow for "logistical reasons". Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono accused GAM for the change of date "intentionally" and "irresponsibly".

GAM refuted the charge. The rebel group said its officials had been granted their visas on Thursday and would have arrived in Geneva yesterday, just hours before the meeting. They would not have had the time to hold an internal meeting with exiled GAM leaders from Sweden, the group said.

GAM commander Muzakir Manaf accused Jakarta of blowing the issue out of proportion to justify a military operation. HDC said yesterday that it planned to talk to the two sides and reschedule another meeting.

Jakarta's tough stance received mixed reactions. Senior MP Ibrahim Ambong said: "We understand the government's decision to pull out of the meeting because this is an insult to Indonesia, but we do hope it will consider rescheduling another meeting." Others warned that military operations would cost the government severely because of the potential number of civilian casualties in the province, where more than 10,000 people have been killed.

Peace deal hangs by a thread after meeting falls through

Agence France Presse - April 25, 2003

War-weary Acehnese urged the Indonesian government and separatist rebels to get serious about saving their fragile peace pact, after a crucial meeting was called off at the last minute.

This weekend's meeting in Geneva of the Joint Council -- grouping government and rebel leaders and foreign mediators -- was scrapped after Jakarta announced Thursday evening it was pulling out.

A Joint Council meeting is seen as the last hope of saving the December 9 pact to end the 26-year war which has cost an estimated 10,000 lives -- mainly civilians.

"The government and GAM [rebel Free Aceh Movement] should realise they should continue the peace process," said coffee stall operator Abdullah, 50. "They have to be serious and think about the needs of the people of Aceh so we can live our lives without any fear."

Acehnese who greeted the deal with euphoria have become increasingly nervous in recent weeks as it faltered amid a wave of killings. Brimob paramilitary police were seen reinforcing one post with extra sandbags Friday. "The government and GAM should make another attempt for a meeting," student activist Mohammad Iqbal told AFP.

Top security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said Jakarta's decision followed a move by GAM to postpone the start of the meeting by two days, from Friday to Sunday. Mediators from the Geneva-based Henry Dunant Centre played down the dispute as a logistical problem and said they hope to reschedule the meeting as soon as possible.

The government had faced strong opposition from elements of the powerful military to the original peace pact. It also faced domestic criticism after complying with a GAM request to switch the venue from Tokyo to Geneva.

Yudhoyono made it clear he saw the postponement as a snub. "The Indonesian people have dignity and honour, which cannot be humiliated by anyone, including the separatist Free Aceh Movement," he told a press conference Thursday night.

Asked if Jakarta should be more lenient with GAM's request, Yudhoyono replied: "... for the Indonesian people, that request truly hurts their dignity and pride." He described GAM's postponement as "an absolutely irresponsible attitude, which will destroy the process for a peaceful solution." Any future talks would depend on an upcoming cabinet meeting, he said.

Some senior military officials have hinted that an all-out attack will be launched on the rebels if the Joint Council talks fail.

Yudhoyono said he had told the military and police "to maintain security in Aceh and to protect civilians." Asked if this implied a military operation, he replied: "Not a single word that I have used mentioned any instruction for a military operation in Aceh." GAM representative Sofyan Ibrahim Tiba said both parties should still respect the peace pact.

GAM rejects Tokyo meeting

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2003

Nani Farida and Tiarma Siboro, Banda Aceh/Jakarta -- The effort to bring peace back to Aceh faces another stiff test after the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebel group threatened to boycott a Joint Council meeting if it went ahead in Tokyo as planned.

GAM senior envoy to the Joint Security Committee (JSC) Sofyan Ibrahim Tiba insisted on Monday that the meeting be held in Geneva, saying Switzerland was known to be a neutral country. "We just want the meeting to be held in Geneva. Why should we go to another country?" Sofyan said.

He denied the Indonesian government's claim that GAM had agreed to Tokyo as the venue for the crucial meeting scheduled for Friday, which will determine the future of the dialog.

Sofyan emphasized that the negotiations would not revise the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (COHA), but simply discuss why the peace zones and the demilitarization process had failed to work.

Due to the disagreement, the Henry Dunant Centre (HDC), which has been facilitating the peace talks, is seeking a new venue for the Joint Council meeting.

HDC project manager David Gorman said that he had discussed the plan to hold the meeting with the warring sides. "They agreed on, for example, the date and the agenda to be discussed, but at this moment, we have no agreement on the location of the meeting," David told The Jakarta Post in Banda Aceh on Monday.

Meanwhile, escalating tension in the province has seriously affected the daily activities of local people. The latest fatality was a student Mayasari, 18, who suffered gunshot wounds to the head.

Local military spokesman Lt. Col. Firdaus Komarno said he had received a report on the finding of a body in the village of Manyang Cut, Pidie, 150 kilometers east of the provincial capital of Banda Aceh. Nearby residents said that they had heard gunshots at 8:30 p.m. on Saturday. But they were too afraid to go outside and found the dead body the next morning.

Commenting on the efforts to salvage the peace deal, M.M. Billah of the National Commission on Human Rights suggested on Monday a reshuffle in the membership of the JSC, arguing that representatives of Acehnese civilians should be included, whom he said knew the situation on the ground better.

"The presence of Acehnese civilians would help both the government and GAM to heed the real aspirations of the silent majority. If these civilians do not have a forum for articulating their views, who will speak for them?" Billah told a press conference at his office. The tripartite monitoring team comprises 50 representatives each from Indonesia, GAM, and HDC.

The differences of opinion between the government and GAM in their interpretations of the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement have been deepening, with GAM claiming that special autonomy serves as the starting point for the all-inclusive dialog, whereas the government insists that special autonomy is the last word.

"It will be impossible for the two warring groups to meet half way if the silent majority is ignored in the peace talks," Billah said. The rights body also supported a peaceful solution in the province through dialog, and urged the government to refrain from using military force.

The HDC, a Swiss-based non-governmental organization, has been facing challenges in its efforts to bridge the differences between Jakarta and GAM in the form of physical threats and mob attacks over what the mobs say is "the JSC's failure to stop GAM from extorting, kidnapping and terrorizing civilians." Earlier in the day, National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar said the separatist movement had been violating Articles 106 to 110 of the Criminal Law by organizing a secessionist movement in the country.

Asked whether a military operation was the answer to quelling separatism in Aceh, Da'i declined to comment but stressed that "since GAM fights with guns, we have to crush them in the same way." Da'i said that in line with the demilitarization process as stipulated in the COHA, the duties of the police's elite Mobile Brigade (Brimob) troopers stationed in the province had already been changed from those of combatants to those of a security restoration unit dealing with law and order.

"But should the planned Joint Council meeting on April 25 result in the need for them to go on the offensive again, then they will do so," Da'i said on the sidelines of a three-day working meeting at National Police Headquarters in South Jakarta.

Tension and demonstration mark Aceh activist's trial

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2003

Nani Farida, Banda Aceh -- The trial of an Aceh activist in Banda Aceh, the capital of Aceh, on Monday turned tense when more than 150 supporters of the Aceh Referendum Information Center (SIRA) staged a demonstration to protest the trial and the arrest of two other SIRA activists.

The demonstrators, mostly students, noisily demanded the release of SIRA chairman Muhammad Nazar while waving referendum flags and Nazar posters as the leader of Nazar's defense team, Abdurrahman Yacob, read out his client's response to the charges brought by the government prosecutors.

The protesters called on the panel of judges to release the defendant as all the prosecution charges against him were baseless.

A protester said in a speech that the arrest of Nazar was against the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement, which they said allowed the people to freely express their aspirations. He accused the Indonesian government of occupying Aceh and arbitrarily victimizing the Acehnese people.

"Thousands of Acehnese have been killed at the hands of soldiers even though Aceh was one of regions that supported the founding of the Republic," he said.

The situation inside and outside the court became heated when two SIRA activists, Muhammad T.A. and Faisal Ridha, were brought by force to the Banda Aceh police station for questioning.

The protesters dispersed when dozens of riot police guarding the court building promised to release the two activists after questioning. So far, however, the pair have yet to be allowed to return home.

During the hearing, Abdurrahman requested the panel of judges to keep their promise to transfer Nazar to the city's Keudah prison from the police detention center as his client was now in the custody of the prosecutors. "The prosecutors are refusing the transfer our client to the prison and the judges are doing nothing to stop this violation," he said.

He threatened to boycott the court if his client was still being held in the police detention center by the time of the next hearing. "We will continue to have difficulties contacting our client for as long as he is in the police's detention center," he said, adding that their client was sick and the medical service in the prison was far better than that in the police detention center.

Abdurrahman also requested to the panel of judges to throw out the prosecution charges against his client as they were vague, and order the prosecution to release him. "The charges are obscure as he was arrested for delivering a speech to the Acehnese people. In fact, his speech made no difference to the situation in the province," he said.

Nazar was arrested on February 12 when he called on Acehnese people to demand a self-determination referendum for the province as the central government has mistreated the people.

The prosecutors charged the defendant with sowing hatred against the government because he violated Chapters 154 and 160 of the Criminal Code, which carry maximum sentences of seven years imprisonment. Nazar has previously served a nine-month jail sentence in Keudah prison for the same offenses.

Security authorities in Aceh have closely monitored SIRA's activities following its support for a self-determination referendum in Aceh, instead of the independence that has long been fought for by the Free Aceh Movement (GAM). SIRA, which was supported by Acehnese students and intellectuals, was involved in the 1999 mass gathering in Banda Aceh, attended by some two million Acehnese people.

The Aceh conflict, which has claimed more than 12,000 lives and displaced hundreds of thousands of others, broke out in 1976 when Acehnese people took up arms to protest what they regarded as injustice and human rights abuses encountered in their attempt to fight for the province's separation from Indonesia.

Megawati dismisses speculation on military operation in Aceh

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2003

Nani Farida, Jakarta/Aceh -- President Megawati Soekarnoputri on Sunday dismissed speculation that the Indonesian Military (TNI) would launch an immediate military operation in Aceh should peace talks fail to settle the Aceh problem.

The President disclosed that what the government had prepared was a contingency plan rather than a military operation. But she refused to give any details of the plan.

"It is not like what the newspapers have reported," President Megawati said during her meeting with Indonesians in Bucharest, Romania, on Saturday night local time. She added that the government would go ahead with a meeting with representatives of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) and the peace mediator, the Henry Dunant Centre (HDC), scheduled for April 25 in Tokyo.

The President's statement came just days after House of Representatives (DPR) leaders suggested that a military operation should only be a last resort.

During the meeting, the President was accompanied by Minister of Foreign Affairs Hassan Wirayuda and TNI chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto, Antara reported.

Hassan said that despite the sporadic clashes between GAM rebels and TNI and police personnel, the President had no plans to cut short her trip.

The latest incident took place in North Aceh at 10.00 p.m. on Saturday when combat troops opened fire on a group of people who were watching a local entertainment event.

The random shooting killed a pregnant woman, Ainul Mardiah, 20, and injured a number of other people. Local military spokesman Lt. Col. Firdaus Komarno said he had not received any information about the incident. Earlier in the day, an Indonesian soldier was stabbed to death at a cattle market in Jeumpa district, Bireuen regency.

As representatives of the government, GAM, and HDC are scheduled to meet in Tokyo, community leaders in Aceh called for a greater role for civilians in solving the Aceh problem.

Tarmizi, an activist with the Aceh People's Forum, suggested that the upcoming meeting should discuss the role of civilians. "So far, any attempts to involve Acehnese civilians in the peace process is considered a provocation," he said. Therefore, he regretted the police's arrest of Muhammad Nazar, chairman of the Aceh Referendum Information Center (SIRA).

Religious leader Imam Suja' suggested that the meeting in Tokyo could revise the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (COHA) as long as it did not change its substance. According to Suja', the most important thing for the Acehnese was that both sides committed themselves to solving the problems of Aceh peacefully.

West Papua

Theys murder verdict: The TNI view

Detik - April 23, 2003

M. Rizai Maslan -- Although they have been convicted for the murder of the chairman of the Papaun Presidium Counicil, the convicted men are seen differently in the eyes of the chief of staff of the army, General Ryamizard Ryacudu. In his eyes, these men are heroes.

"I don't know, people say they did wrong, they broke the law. What law? Okay, we are a state based on the rule of law, so they have been punished. But for me, they are heroes because the person they killed was a rebel leader."

This view was expressed by the former commander of Kostrad, speaking on the occasion of the installation of Lt. General Darsono as deputy chief of staff on 23 April.

"If they have to be punished, keep it light, nothing heavy like being court-martialed. That can't be right. We oppose rebels. If their leader dies by improper means, okay, they have to be punished."

The chief of staff also wondered why no action has been taken against the rebels. These days, he lamented, the military are the victims because no action is being taken against rebel actions. "For a long time, there has been no punishment for people who raise flags, rebel. Nothing is done, " he said, and in the end, the TNI gets clobbered. If the state had acted, such things wouldn't happen.

On the same occasion Commander General of Kopassus, Major-General Sriyanto said he had to contain himself when we heard about the conviction of some of his men. "I was saddened that some of my men who were sent as non-organic troops to help the Trikora military command defend the Unitary State of Indonesia (NKRI) had become victims."

He said his men had tried to persuade Theys not to proclaim an Independent Papua on 1 December 2002 (sic) or that he should at least postpone this. "But things happened differently on the ground." Commenting on what would now follow after the verdict, Sriyanto said the rights of the convicted men were under consideration. "Of course, we will appeal against the verdict."

As reported earlier, seven soldiers from Tribuana Satgas Papua who were accused in connection with the death of Theys were sentenced to between three and three and a half years. Some of them were also discharged, including the Tribuana commander, Lt.Colonel Hartomo.

[Translated by Tapol]

Nine soldiers arrested for arsenal burglary

Jakarta Post - April 24, 2003

Nethy Dharma Somba, Jayapura -- The military police unit of the Trikora Military Command overseeing Papua has arrested nine soldiers and seven civilians for their alleged involvement in the April 4 arsenal burglary in Wamena, in which two soldiers and a Free Papua Movement (OPM) rebel were killed.

The suspects arrived in Jayapura from Wamena on Wednesday and were placed in the detention facility at the military command headquarters in the city.

Military police unit chief Lt. Col. Sutarna identified the nine soldiers as Maj. Sgt. KI, First Sgt. PP, Chief Corp. PK, First Pvt. EK, First Sgt. YM, Second Corp. MIJ, First Sgt. IK, First Sgt. IK and Second Lt. PW, and confirmed that they were all members of the Wamena Military District.

He said six of the nine suspects were being charged with negligence, for which they faced one year imprisonment.

"Second Lt. PW and First Sgt. IK will stand trial for their part in giving weapons and ammunition to the rebels, who shot dead two soldiers. Under military law, they face a maximum ten years' imprisonment," he added.

Further, Sutarna said First Sgt. SJ was facing death row or a life sentence for his involvement in helping the rebels attack the two soldiers, which resulted in their deaths.

"All nine suspects will stand trial at the military tribunal and will be punished as befitting the part they played in the arsenal burglary," he said, adding that the nine suspects would likely be dismissed from military service.

Sutarna identified the nine civilian suspects as Kanius Murib, Nugungga Talenggen, Kimanus Wenda, Yaprai Murib, Enos Locobal, Des Wenda and Mikael Heselo, who are to be tried at the Jayapura District Court.

"The seven will be indicted for helping the rebels to launch the attack and break into the arsenal. We have appointed Fantrisno R. Tagihuma as their defense attorney in the case," he said.

Two soldiers, First Lt. A. Napitupulu and First Sgt. Ruben Lena, and one rebel, Islea Murib, were killed when a group of 15 OPM rebels attacked the two on-duty soldiers in their attempt to break into the Army's arsenal in Wamena Military District. After killing the two soldiers, the rebels stole 29 M-16, SP and AK-47 rifles and thousands of ammunition rounds.

Twenty-one of the 29 rifles have already been recovered in an operation involving 144 soldiers of the Army's Special Forces (Kopassus) and the Strategic Reserve Command (Kostrad), who helped the local military to hunt down the rebels.

Local religious groups and non-governmental organizations have expressed their deep concern over the arsenal burglary and the subsequent military deployment, but called on the government not to use the incident as a reason to relaunch a military operation in the province.

Thousands of people were killed in the 1980s and the 1990s when the government launched a military operation to crush the Free Papua Movement.

Troops burn down homes of inhabitants in Papua

Elsham news report - April 21, 2003

Wamena -- With the apparent approval of the governor of Papua, Yab Solosa, a joint military unit composed of Kopassus, Kostrad 413 and Rapid Reaction Force troops took action in the direction of the District of Kuyawage, west of Wamena, and burnt down the homes of inhabitants, as well as schools, medical centres and teachers' homes.

Livestock in the kampungs located round Kuyawage were also destroyed. Five kampungs; Yugume, Luarem, Wupaga, Nenggeagen and Mume, were burnt to the ground and the inhabitants fled to nearby forests. Officials from the clinics and teachers also fled although they had been permitted to remain in the kampungs wearing their official uniforms.

PK (35), an official of the Baptist Church who received a report about the incident from local people, said that the joint military operation had been underway since Saturday, 19 April, beginning with Yugume and Lauren kampungs which lie to the south of Kuyawage.

The troops then moved in the direction of Wupaga which lies in the centre of Kuyawaga. From there, they went to two kampungs west of Kuyawage, Nenggeogim and Mume. PK also said that the military were expected to continue their operations on Tuesday, going in the direction of four kampungs, Uwome, Pulau, Tumbugur and Nguari which lie to the north of Kuyawag.

Precise information about the number of homes burnt down is not yet available. Whereas in Kuyawage the troops burnt down kampungs without anyone stopping them, a similar operation in Kurima, to the south of Wamena, was opposed by First Lieutenant Pilius Wenda (56), the military commander of Kurima. Because he opposed the operation, he was severely beaten up and thrown into a military police cell in Wamena, Jayawijaya. Despite opposition from the local military commander, it would appear that Kostrad 413 troops together with Briimob commander Sem Itlay are still deterimined to continue with the sweepings.

During a sweeping operation, police officer Sem Itlay arrested and maltreated Soleman Hesegem (35) and Paulina Lantipo, (24) from the kampung of Meaukuloa in the village of Anjelma, Kurima district. Paulina Lantipo (24), who is the wife of Soleman Hesegem, was held firmly by the neck and then stripped naked. by the police officer. Soleman was taken into custody for allegedly being in contact with two members of TPN/OPM, Mickhael Heselo (39) dan Maijend TPN/OPM Yanto Tabuni.

According to a report from Elsham's post in Wamena, Mickhael Heselo and Soleman Hesegem were recently detained and taken to Kurima for interrogation but were later released.

The sweeping operations currently underway remind us of an operation on 12 May 1998 in the kampungs of Bela, Alama and Mapnduma, in the District of Wamena, when troops dropped into the area burnt down 166 homes and 13 churches. A total of 213 people subsequently died because of lack of food and medicines. Twenty people were killed and seven women were raped.

Guilty verdict but does the punishment fit the crime?

Radio Australia - April 22, 2003

Seven of Indonesia's Kopassus special forces soldiers have been found guilty by an Indonesian court over the murder of Papuan pro independence leader They's Eluay in 2001. But the seven men face at most three and a half years in jail, and in some cases haven't even been stripped of their place in the Army.

Presenter/Interviewer: Tim Palmer, Indonesia Correspondent

Speakers: Sidney Jones, International Crisis Group, Jakarta; Willy Mandowan, Papuan Presidium Moderator; Janet Eluay,Theys Eluay widow

Tim Palmer: The seven elite Kopassus soldiers standing before the Court in Surabaya today were, in the words of their defence council, all heroes -- men serving Indonesia at the highest level.

But the Court found they were something much less, tied up in a murky plot to silence a 64-year-old man who refused to stop championing Papuan independence and ended up strangled in a car.

Lieutenant Colonel Hartomo had tried to court Theys Eluay to try and change his mind, but when that didn't work he gave the message to his men to use stronger methods. For motivating the murder, Hartomo was today sentenced to three-and-a-half years' jail.

What happened on the night of his death is no clearer following the court case. Theys Eluay was the invited guest at a Kopassus dinner, but when Kopassus soldiers accompanied him home, it's alleged they argued over politics.

One Private, convicted today, said he placed his hand over Theys Eluay's mouth for as long as five minutes. When they left him in the car, the soldiers insist Theys Eluay was alive. He was found throttled to death the next morning.

The sentencing of seven members of Kopassus to jail is something of a watershed for a body that's long been accused of abducting and torturing dissidents in Indonesia. But the sentences are light and in some cases the soldiers found guilty won't even be forced to leave army ranks.

Beyond that, the lack of a clear picture for the military court over who really ordered the killing has undercut its credibility. Sydney Jones of the International Crisis Group.

Sydney Jones: Papuans are completely angered by the leniency shown these people. So even if they served some time, so what? There's no justice, as far as the Papuans are concerned. We don't know who gave the command and we don't know precisely what the motivation was. And with no information, how can you have any sense of justice?

Tim Palmer: And that's certainly how Papuan figures see it. Papuan presidium moderator Willy Mondoy says the wrong forum meant the trial was a sham.

Willy Mondoy: The City of Papua Council, on behalf of the people of West Papua, reject the process and the result of the military tribunal. It is a planned assassination and execution. Systematically planned and executed, no motive being properly investigated. Who responsible for the assassination and the killing was not clear.

Tim Palmer: Who do you think is responsible?

Willy Mondoy: Hartomo would not do it alone and that's why we, at an early stage, demanded a thorough investigation to be conducted by the Commission of Human Rights. Not this inquiry done through the Presidential decree. We cannot have the killer judge the killer.

Tim Palmer: You're alleging that the order for this killing was given at a political level?

Willy Mondoy: Yes, it's been totally politically motivated.

Tim Palmer: What do you think the result of this killing is in the end?

Willy Mondoy: That Theys Eluay has planted the morning star flag, the nationalism in the heart of all Papuans. It doesn't matter how many you kill, it never stops the aspirations of the people.

Tim Palmer: Theys Eluay's widow, Janik, echoes that. She believes President Megawati should accept responsibility for the killing. But she says the murder failed to achieve its political aim.

[Sound of Janik speaking]

"They hoped to kidnap and kill Theys so the voice of Papuans would vanish. But it won't happen. Even though they killed him, Papuans continue to talk of independence," she said after the verdicts were read.

Rights groups want deeper probe into Eluey's killing

Associated Press - April 22, 2003

Jakarta -- Human rights groups on Tuesday called for a deeper investigation into the killing of an independence leader in Indonesia's Papua province, saying the conviction and jailing of seven soldiers haven't uncovered who gave the order for the slaying.

A military court on Monday found the members of the army's special Kopassus forces guilty of involvement in the 2001 death of Theys Eluay, who had campaigned for greater autonomy for Indonesia's easternmost province. The men weren't charged with murder but were found guilty of mistreatment and battery leading to Eluay's death.

Activists said the sentences, from 2 to 3 1/2 years, were too light. Four of them were also dismissed from the army. "While we've seen people sentenced, we haven't seen justice. A lot of information hasn't come out," said Sidney Jones from the Brussels-based International Crisis Group. "Clearly Papuans are very unhappy with the rightness of the sentence. It is still extremely unclear who gave the order and why," she said.

Eluay was slain on the outskirts of the provincial capital, Jayapura, as he drove home from a dinner hosted by the local regiment of the army's special forces unit.

"From the start, we were very disappointed with the trial," said Anum Siregar, Eluay's lawyer and an activist with the Irian- Alliance of Democracy for Papua. "They were found guilty of battery leading to death but the trial should have been about pre-planned murder. This means that we will never know who were the real players behind it."

Papua, formerly known as Irian Jaya, covers the eastern half of New Guinea island and was a Dutch colony until Indonesia annexed it in 1963. The takeover was formalized in 1969 through a UN- sponsored vote by traditional leaders. For years rights groups and independence activists claimed the ballot was a sham. A loosely organized guerrilla group has been fighting for Indonesian rule.

Eluay's death sparked mass protests and energized an independence movement that had largely been ignored by the international community and weakened by internal political divisions. The Washington-based Robert F. Kennedy Center for Human Rights last week asked the Indonesian army to halt all operations in Papua and transfer power to the police. "The operation against civilians has included illegal detention, torture of detainees, burning down of homes, and a reintroduction into Papua of Indonesia's notorious Kopassus [special forces]," the center said in a statement.

Jones said Jakarta should tackle Papuan human rights and autonomy issues. "Unless and until the central government addresses the grievances, we are not going to see a reduction in the independence movement there," said Jones.

Four soldiers sentenced for murder of Theys Eluay

Radio Australia - April 22, 2003

An Indonesian military court has sentenced four special forces soldiers for up to three and a half years jail for the murder of Papuan pro-independence leader Theys Eluay in November 2001. Another three Kopassus soldiers are still awaiting their verdicts. Mr Eluay was killed while being driven home from a dinner hosted at the Kopassus headquarters in the Papuan capital Jayapura. His body was found the following day.

Transcript:

Lopresti: Tim what has been the reaction if any to these sentences?

Palmer: "Very little reaction in Indonesia and I think that's partially because Indonesia sought a low profile to this case. It sought to hide the matter away if you like in a military tribunal in Surabaya rather than have the matter dealt in a more public forum, as demanded by the Papuan Presidium for example in Papua itself."

"So to some extent this matter hasn't received a great deal of coverage in Indonesia, but in Papua the reaction has been of course very strong, especially to the sentences which are considered very light of course. Willy Mandowan of the Papua Presidium said that they reject both the process and the result in this matter and believe this was a crime against humanity and should have been dealt with at some level in either a civil court or in a human rights hearing."

Lopresti: Now Lieutenant Colonel Hartono got three and a half years jail, he was the highest-ranking Kopassus soldier on trial. What did the court say about his involvement in the murder of Theys Eluay?

Palmer: "Essentially the court blamed him for motivating the crime saying that he'd spoken to his subordinates and had told them that he basically wanted Theys Eluay quietened, he wanted them to persuade Theys Eluay and the court said, through mistreatment to stop talking about independence. And so it was that on that night in November 2001 Theys Eluay was driven away from the Kopassus Hero's Day dinner that he'd been invited to, supposedly to be driven home by a number of Kopassus soldiers."

"On the way they sought to convince him they say to stop pursuing the cause of independence, Theys Eluay expressed the fact he wasn't going to do that, he'd lost faith with Jakarta's promises of autonomy, and at some stage when the argument got hot the soldiers claim he started panicking and calling thief at which point the most junior officers, who was also given a three and a half year sentence today covered his mouth for five minutes the officer said, but left him alive when he left the car. The officer said he was still speaking but speaking quietly. Of course the post mortem evidence suggested anything but that, that Theys Eluay was throttled in the car and found the next morning dead in the vehicle with his eyes and tongue protruding, and that his driver had also disappeared and hasn't been seen since."

Lopresti: Now Tim, these soldiers could have faced a fifteen year jail term, they got three years. Is there any sense especially from the Papuans that basically they got off scot-free?

Palmer: "Oh the Papuans think that this whole process has been botched, I think other international observers will be very concerned about the lightness of the sentences, and there will be strong questions asked about whether these sentences will be served in full. Two of the officers who were given sentences today remain officers in the Indonesian army, they weren't even discharged."

"So there will of course be some serious concern about the levity of the sentences, but of course the whole issue turns more spotlight on Indonesia's handling of the Papua situation given the events of the Freeport shooting last year, and of course the death in custody of another Papuan independence figure just last week in Papua."

Lopresti: There are three other Kopassus soldiers awaiting trial. Are they likely to also be sentenced?

Palmer: "We are awaiting details of the sentence, we thought they would be sentenced in the hours following the initial four sentences, we're still waiting to hear exactly how the process is going to deal with those three men."

Soldiers given light sentences for killing Eluay

Agence France Presse - April 21, 2003

Four Indonesian special forces soldiers who killed a Papuan provincial leader while trying to silence his calls for independence were jailed for between 36 and 42 months.

"The defendants were proven guilty of jointly engaging in mistreatment that led to the death of Theys Hiyo Eluay," said Judge Colonel Yamini in a military court.

Independence activists from the easternmost province described the trial as a farce and said it failed to establish who gave the order to silence Eluay.

The killing in November 2001 inflamed separatist sentiment in Papua, where the military has long been accused of killing, torturing and raping civilians.

Lieutenant Colonel Hartomo and Private Achmad Zulfahmi were jailed for 42 months and discharged from the army. Captain Rionardo and First Sergeant Asrial were jailed for three years but not discharged.

Verdicts were to be passed later Monday on three other special forces soldiers from the Kopassus unit.

Eluay was killed while being driven home from a dinner hosted at the Kopassus headquarters in the provincial capital Jayapura. His body was found the following day, his face blackened from effects of suffocation and his tongue protruding.

One of those awaiting a verdict, Lieutenant Agus Supriyanto, has told the court that his superiors ordered him and Zulfahmi to pressure Eluay to stop promoting independence.

As they drove Eluay home from the dinner, Supriyanto said he and Zulfahmi tried to dissuade him from speaking out on the subject. But Eluay became upset and started shouting at them, prompting Zulfahmi to clamp his hand over Eluay's mouth, Supriyanto has said. Soldiers have said Eluay was weak but alive when they left him.

Prosecutors have said Hartomo "motivated other persons to conduct the mistreatment." Defence lawyers said they would appeal. They have described their clients as heroes who struggled to prevent Indonesia from breaking up. The soldiers could been been jailed for 15 years if found guilty of murder.

A low-level armed revolt has been waged in the resource-rich province since Jakarta took it over in 1963 from Dutch colonial rulers. Eluay headed the Papua Presidium Council, which campaigned peacefully for independence.

Tom Beanal, council vice-president, said he could not take the military court seriously. "The military killed him. How can they make the tribunal?" Beanal told AFP in Jakarta. "I reject this. I don't see any integrity to it." Beanal said the murder was a human rights violation and should be handled by an international tribunal.

Willy Mandowen, a presidium moderator, suggested that the soldiers themselves were scapegoats. "The motivation, why Theys was killed, who is responsible and who gave the order were questions not addressed in the military trial," he said.

Mandowen said authorities were "castrating the case" by bring it before a military tribunal when a crime against humanity was involved. "The process only sacrificed soldiers and the feeling of justice of the Papuan people."

Last week Amnesty International said it was investigating a report that troops had tortured villagers and torched homes during a hunt for rebels in Papua. Also last week a suspect died in army detention in Papua. A local rights activist said soldiers tied ropes around the victim's neck and paraded him through his home village the previous day.

Human Rights Watch called for an independent investigation into that death, which it said "will only increase the local climate of fear and intimidation."

Labour issues

Workers stage rally against decision to freeze export permit

Antara - April 25, 2003

Samarinda, E Kalimantan -- Some 400 workers of the Indonesian forestry company, PT Wana Rimba Kencana, staged a rally in front of the East Kalimantan governor's office here Friday to reject the Industry and Trade Ministry's unilateral decision to freeze the company's permit to export plywood.

The rally aims to win the local administration's sympathy toward the company's fate following the ministerial decree to freeze its permit to export plywood, demonstrator, Dekri Suaban, said.

The decision to freeze Wana Rimba Kencana's export permit has caused it to lay off 1,000 workers in March, none of whom has received a severance pay because the company cannot export its products, he said.

Workers protest contract system

Jakarta Post - April 25, 2003

Jakarta -- Some 2,000 workers of PT EDS Manufacturing Indonesia, a cable producer on Jl. Raya Serang, Balaraja district, staged a rally at the regency manpower agency office here on Thursday to demand that the company's contract system for workers be scrapped.

The workers, mostly females, filed a complaint with the office because the company's management had not responded to their demand although they had been on strike for five days.

Sriwati, who has been working for two years with the company, said the workers also demanded a transportation allowance and a leave allowance. In addition, they asked the company to allow them to propose a work agreement between workers and the management.

The company human resources manager Slamet said that the management would dismiss the striking workers because the company regulation only tolerated absenteeism for two days.

War in Iraq

2,000 turn up in Yogyakarta, calling for Jihad

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2003

Jakarta -- At least 2,000 people marched through the streets of Yogyajarta in central Java on Sunday, calling for a holy war against the United States in one of the largest protests here against the US-led coalition in Iraq in recent weeks.

Dressed in traditional Muslim attire, demonstrators carried banners that read "Jihad [holy war] is the only solution for the world crisis" and "Take your sword, prepare for Jihad." Police were on hand to prevent any violence, but no arrests were made and the march was largely peaceful.

Most of the protesters came from Indonesia's main Muslim groups Muhammadiyah, Majelis Mujahiddin Indonesia and Nahdlatul Ulama, which organized the march, Associated Press reported.

Protest leader Ahmad Mursyidi criticized the Indonesian government for not responding strongly enough over the Iraq and called on President Megawati Sukarnoputri's government to end diplomatic relations with the United States. But observers say the government's repeated condemnations of the Iraqi invasion appear to have helped defuse public discontent.

While many in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, were against the war in Iraq, demonstrations here have been mostly peaceful and considerably smaller than those held during the US-led attack on Afghanistan in 2001.

Mursyidi also called for a boycott of American goods. "Stop buying McDonald's and KFC, they are American products. If you buy them it means you support the US," said Mursyidi told the crowd.

'War on terrorism'

Police warn of future terror attacks despite mass arrests

Agence France Presse - April 25, 2003

Police warned Indonesians to be on guard against future terror attacks despite a major roundup of Jemaah Islamiyah suspects and the seizure of arms and explosives.

"Threats of new attacks always exist. We have to remain vigilant," said national police spokesman Zainuri Lubis Thursday.

The country's police chief General Da'i Bachtiar has said the seizures indicated that Southeast Asian terror network Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) was planning fresh terrorist attacks before next year's general elections.

JI is blamed for the bombing of two Bali nightspots last October which killed 202 people and for dozens of other deadly attacks in recent years.

A bomb exploded early Thursday in Central Jakarta but no one was hurt and damage was slight. Bachtiar said it was designed to create fear among the public but he did not know who was responsible.

Police Wednesday announced the arrest of 18 suspected JI members, including three Bali suspects who will be flown to the resort island for questioning.

"We were looking for Bali bombing suspects and we found them. It turned out that they confessed to be members of JI and know each other," Lubis told AFP. A fourth suspect is also believed to have taken part in the Bali plot but his name could not be revealed, Lubis said.

JI's alleged "emir" or leader, Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, went on trial Wednesday for treason. Among the 18 detainees is Abu Rusdan, who according to police replaced Bashir as leader after Bashir was arrested last October. Bachtiar said reports of Rusdan's status came from detained JI members.

"Abu Bakar Bashir is facing a legal process. They might have [decided to] appoint an interim leader, maybe without a formal letter of appointment," he said.

The timing of the arrests was likely a deliberate effort to bolster the case against Bashir, said Sidney Jones of the International Crisis Group of political analysts.

"That may well have been a deliberate effort to say the JI indeed exists as an organisation and that we have additional people that may be able to provide evidence on Bashir," she told AFP.

In addition to Rusdan police say they detained a sub-regional chief of JI, a Malaysian called Nasir Abbas. "I think the police get a lot of credit because these are important figures," Jones said.

Abbas is said to be a brother-in-law of Mukhlas, who is a key suspect in the Bali bombing and one of the 30 people already detained on the island. Police said Abbas was involved in the Atrium mall bombing in Jakarta in August 2001.

Jones said she had received information late last year that even before the Bali bombings another man preferred by JI hardliners had, in practice, taken over leadership from Bashir. Bashir remained the network's official leader, she said.

The three new Bali suspects are Saad alias Ahmad Roichan, Umar Besar alias Wayan, and Sawad. Lubis said eight others are still being sought. He said police seized two handguns, ammunition and bomb ingredients from the JI suspects.

Indonesia's top detective Erwin Mappaseng was quoted by Kompas newspaper as saying that Rusdan's name emerged during investigation of the Bali bombing.

Bashir is not accused over the Bali blasts. He is charged with waging a jihad or holy war to topple the Jakarta government and set up an Islamic state. He allegedly authorised a series of bomb attacks on churches across the country on Christmas Eve 2000, which killed 19 people. He faces a 20-year jail term if convicted of treason.

Bomb explodes near UN building in Jakarta

Jakarta Post - April 25, 2003

Jakarta -- A small pipe bomb exploded near the main United Nations building in Indonesia's capital yesterday, just a day after the trial of the leader of a radical Islamic group opened here.

No injuries were reported from the pre-dawn blast, which slightly damaged a foot bridge spanning a major downtown avenue and left a 30-cm hole in the pavement. The explosion was about 30 m from the UN building, which was not damaged, a UN security official said.

A search of the surrounding area turned up two small unexploded devices, police said. "We don't even know if the device was aimed at our building," said the UN security official.

National police chief General Da'i Bachtiar maintained that the bomb was just a low explosive to trigger fear among the public. Speaking to journalists, he said the blast could also be aimed at showing that the group committing the bomb attacks continues to exist.

No one claimed responsibility for the explosion. People in Jakarta were shocked by the blast as it happened a day after Jemaah Islamiah (JI) leader Abu Bakar Bashir went on trial for a series of bombings which the prosecutors said were aimed at weakening the government.

Almost at the same time as the opening of Bashir's trial, police arrested 18 other JI members on charges of involvement in terrorism. The UN has blacklisted JI as a terrorist organisation.

Police arrest more JI members, seize guns and explosives

Agence France Presse - April 23, 2003

Indonesian police said they have arrested 18 more suspected members of the Jemaah Islamiyah terror network and seized guns and explosives.

As the Muslim cleric accused of leading JI went on trial for treason, national police chief General Da'i Bachtiar said the seizures indicated that suspects were planning fresh terrorist attacks before next year's general elections.

Among those arrested was Abu Rusdan, who police said had taken over from Abu Bakar Bashir as leader of JI.

The arrests and arms finds were announced the same day as Bashir's trial began in Jakarta. JI is blamed for the Bali blasts last October 12 which killed 202 people and for a string of other bombings.

"Earlier today we have arrested someone who you might not be too familiar with, but he has been identified as Abu Rusdan," national detective chief Erwin Mappaseng told reporters.

"Abu Rusdan, according to information from Nasir Abbas and several other people, is the current emir [leader] of Jemaah Islamiyah, the successor of Abu Bakar Bashir." Nasir Abbas, a Malaysian, is said to be a sub-regional chief of JI. His arrest was announced earlier Wednesday by Mappaseng. Mappaseng said Rusdan took over the regional network when Bashir was arrested last October 20.

The 18 arrests -- including three more Bali suspects -- appeared to mark a major breakthrough in the campaign to crush JI, which dreams of creating a pan-Islamic state.

It aims to destabilise the region through terror attacks and unite Indonesia, Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore and the southern Philippines under a fundamentalist umbrella.

Rusdan, an Indonesian, was detained in the town of Kudus in Central Java earlier Wednesday. He replaced Bashir as "the head following the Bali bombing," Mappaseng said, adding that police were preparing charges against him.

The three Bali suspects were named as Syawab, alias Sarjio, who allegedly helped assemble the bombs; Umar Besar, alias Wayan, whose photofit was released last year; and Ahmad Rohim, alias Saad.

Nasir Abbas was arrested in Bekasi near Jakarta on Friday. Three others were held at Cileungsi, 12 more at Palu in Central Sulawesi and one at an undisclosed location.

JI has been strongly linked to the al-Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden. It has a network of supporters across Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and the southern Philippines and has reached out to Muslim organisations in Thailand and Myanmar, the International Crisis Group said in a report last year.

In Indonesia JI had staged some 50 bombings or attempted bombings since April 1999 including the Bali blasts, the research group said. These included bombings on Christmas Eve 2000 of 38 churches or priests which killed 19 people.

Singapore has 32 suspected JI militants in custody. And Malaysia says that since May 2001 it has detained 90 militant suspects including 65 members of JI.

Bashir, the alleged co-founder of JI, is accused in his indictment of waging a jihad or holy war to topple the Jakarta government and set up an Islamic state. He faces a 20-year jail term if convicted of treason.

Islamic cleric in court on treason charge

Radio Australia - April 23, 2003

Cleric Abu Bakar Bashir who heads the conservative Indonesian Mujahidin Council, has faced court in Jakarta charged with attempting to overthrow the Indonesian state. Mr Bashir is accused of setting up the outlawed Jemaah Islamiyah group 10 years ago, as part of a plan to replace the Government with an Islamic state. In a 25-page indictment read to the court, prosecutors accused Mr Bashir of involvement in bomb attacks on Christian churches and plans to assassinate now President Megawati Sukarnoputri.

Presenter/Interviewer: Tricia Fitzgerald

Speakers: Abu Bakar Bashir, head of Indonesian Mujahidin Council; Tim Palmer, ABC Correspondent Jakarta; Mahendradata, lawyer for Abu Bakar Bashir; Sidney Jones, International Crisis Group Indonesia.

Fitzgerald: Last year the 65-year old Abu Bakar Bashir claimed he hated President Megawati Sukarnoputri because she was serving US and Jewish interests and was not a good muslim.

Bashir: I very much hate the attitude of Megawati's government because it is a secular government. The President is closer to Jews and non-believers than she is to Islam, although she is outwardly a Muslim, she is stupid and does not understand Islam properly. So Megawati's attitude and her acceptance of anti- terrorism aid from the United States is a great disaster for Muslims.

Fitzgerald: Now he stands accused of plotting to assassinate the President, when she was vice president, and of attempting to overthrow Indonesia's secular Government. If convicted Mr Bashir faces a 15-year-to-life jail term, but the ABC's Tim Palmer says he appeared in court smiling and relaxed.

Palmer: The court was quiet until Abu Bakar Bashir actually entered the court room, at which point around 100 supporters, many of them wearing vests with the words "Taliban or Mujahidin" on them, and many of them were supporters who had travelled from central Java from Solo where the Ngruki Santran is located and Abu Bakar Bashir was in charge of it till his arrest. They erupted the moment he walked into the court room calling out "?", later on making calls about America who's behind terrorism.

Fitzgerald: The long list of indictments held few surprises ... no references to the Bali bombings, but allegations that Mr Bashir planned bomb attacks on western embassy buildings in Singapore and that he orchestrated deadly bomb attacks on churches in Indonesia on Christmas Eve two years ago. Mr Bashir's lawyer Mahendradata says there is little evidence to support those claims and that the case has been put up just to pacify the US government.

Mahendradata: Who's behind the prosecution? The United States government and at least from United States agency. United States now need Abu Bakar Bashir to be a target; in every country they have a target.

Fitzgerald: Sidney Jones of the International Crisis Group in Indonesia says it's crucial that the Indonesian Government is seen to be conducting a fair trial so that it doesn't alienate itself from Muslim voters. She says at this stage hard evidence linking Mr Bashir to the charges will be hard to muster.

Jones: The indictment is based largely on the witness testimony of Fais Abu Bakar Bafana, who's currently detained in Singapore, who will not be brought to Jakarta and produced in court as a witness although his testimony can be used in court. But his lawyers are certainly going to complain about the fact that they can't cross examine Fais Bafana in the court room. It's based on the documents that were found in Solo, including a book about the structure and ideological aims of Jemaah Islamiah, but that's a written document and it's not clear that the book in and of itself proves that Jemaah Islamiah was aimed at attacking the Indonesian government, and it's based on the witnessed testimony of some of the Bali suspects who have since recanted their testimony as it related to Abu Bakar Bashir. Now there may well be other evidence that isn't reflected in the indictment per se, but if those three kinds of sources represent the main body of the evidence for the indictment it is going to be a tricky trial.

Fitzgerald: Sidney Jones says if the state loses this case and Mr Bashir is found not guilty it won't have a dramatic impact on Indonesia's campaign to round up terrorist elements.

Jones: Right now there are a lot of people in prison, the Bali bombing trials themselves are going to start in early May. There will certainly be convictions from that set of trials, though I think the Indonesian government has demonstrated that it does have the will to prosecute people on terrorism charges and even if on this particular case they can't prove the accusations, it's not going to be as damaging a blow as it would have been if we hadn't had all these other arrests.

Tight security surrounds cleric's trial

Melbourne Age - April 24 , 2003

Matthew Moore, Jakarta -- Abu Bakar Bashir had no reason to look lonely as he sat facing the judges who could lock him up for life. After all, he's got 80 lawyers on his team, and nearly a quarter of them were lined up beside him in rows three deep.

The rest were absent, saving their energy for another day, a wise move if the document in front of the head judge was any guide.

Tied with a pale green ribbon, the evidence dossier stood close to 30 centimetres high, full of promise of a lengthy and contentious trial of Indonesia's infamous preacher and the alleged head of the outlawed group blamed for the Bali bombings, Jemaah Islamiah The 600 armed police guarding the Bureau of Meteorology building, fitted out for the special sitting of the Jakarta Central District Court, were another sign that Bashir may have more supporters than have turned out for him lately.

Around 200 of them were in court yesterday, mainly young men in vests with words like "Mujahidin" emblazoned across their backs. Mostly they came overnight on buses from West Java and from Bashir's home in Solo where he used to run his Ngruki Islamic boarding school before he was arrested a week after the Bali bombing. Not all were young, but they all believed Bashir was charged because of outside pressure.

Afif Abdul Majid, 52, a teacher at Bashir's school was typical: "He's only been charged because of pressure from America." Asked who did the Bali bombings if it was not JI, he said: "I think it was organised by God, the same as the Oklahoma City bomb." For more than an hour they sat quietly before erupting with calls of "Allahu Akbar", or God is Great, as Bashir was led into the court. In his white skull cap with an orange shawl over his shoulder Bashir sat alone and listened quietly as he heard the 25-page indictment against him read out.

He was "the leader and organiser of treason with the intention of overthrowing the Government, namely to realise plans to establish an Islamic state of Indonesia". Specifically he was accused of approving the bombing of 38 Indonesian churches on Christmas 2000, and of approving an attack on US interests in Singapore.

When the head judge asked if he understood the charges, Bashir replied: "Yes, God willing." Asked if he would submit a defence plea, he said: "Later. I don't accept the charges." As police led him from the court through a mass of jostling supporters, Bashir said: "I don't accept these charges, These are lies from America," according to reporters close to him.

Prosecutors say they will produce 50 witnesses to get the conviction that would demonstrate to the world how Indonesia has got tough on terrorism.

But Bashir's defence team says the witnesses don't include two key figures who have made the substantial allegations against him. Former senior JI member Faiz Abu Bakar Bafanar is now in jail in Singapore and won't give evidence.

Nor will Omar Al-Faruq, who told the CIA of JI's bombing plans in September but who is now held somewhere in secret.

With a week-long adjournment granted after yesterday's 70-minute hearing, lawyers for Bashir predicted it could be three months before there is a verdict.

Bashir treason trial begins but proof elusive on Bali blasts

Sydney Morning Herald - April 23, 2003

Matthew Moore, Jakarta -- He was the first person to be accused of planning the Bali bombings, but when Indonesia's most notorious preacher, Abu Bakar Bashir, goes on trial in a Jakarta court today it will not be for his role in that crime.

Instead Bashir will stand accused of treason, an offence that carries a 20-year sentence. The 25-page indictment filed in the court describes him as the emir, or leader, of Jemaah Islamiah (JI), the regional network accused of a series of terrorist bombings, including those in Bali. "The defendant is the leader and organiser of treason with the intention of toppling the government and fulfilling his intention of setting up the Islamic state of Indonesia," it says.

Bashir also faces three comparatively minor immigration offences, and there is a brief mention in the indictment of a meeting in Bashir's house in March 2001 where plans to assassinate the then Indonesian vice-president, Megawati Soekarnoputri were discussed. He is also accused of approving a plan, foiled by Singapore police, to bomb United States interests in Singapore. Demonstrating his involvement in these matters is the challenge for prosecutors.

Police believe they have obtained enough evidence to prove Bashir "gave his blessing" to 38 bombings in 11 cities on Christmas Eve 2000. Nineteen people were killed.

In the treason action, police have also named Hambali, JI's former operations chief and Asia's most wanted man, and two key figures awaiting trial for the Bali bombings, Imam Samudra and Mukhlas.

While police believe they can convict Bashir for his role in the Christmas bombings, they have failed to get the evidence needed to show he was directly involved in the Bali bombings.

Police had been happy to promote the view that Bashir was involved in Bali, hinting it was just a matter of time before he was held to account for his role.

The national police chief, General Da'i Bachtiar, told parliament that JI was definitely behind the Bali attacks. The chief investigator of the Bali bombings, General Made Pastika, went further and said those accused of the blasts had met Bashir before and after the attack.

There have been numerous reports about Bashir's visits to the East Java township of Tenggulun, home of the bombing suspect Amrozi, the last one made shortly before Amrozi bought the vehicle used in the attack.

Despite plenty of information pointing to Bashir, hard evidence about his role in Bali has remained elusive, as the Federal Police Commissioner, Mick Keelty, indicated last year.

"The real issue is going to be obtaining direct evidence," he said. "So far we have only circumstantial material, and strong inferences are being drawn from that.

Short of admissions from Bashir, there is a long way to go in terms of actually linking him to the planning of the Bali bombings." Bashir refuses to admit JI exists or that he is its leader.

Spooked by ASIO, Indonesians turn inwards

Sydney Morning Herald - April 22 , 2003

Not one charge has been laid in Sydney since the post-Bali raids on six Indonesian families, but 255 Indonesians have been locked up since and the community feels under siege. Now some have even lost trust in each other. Linda Morris writes.

These days ASIO and Australian Federal Police don't hammer on doors in bullet-proof vests in their search for suspected terrorist cells of Jemaah Islamiah in Sydney. They make appointments and knock first.

But stick or carrot, the results are the same: no charges have been laid against Indonesian Muslims in Sydney. And, very quietly and without fanfare, ASIO has been returning hundreds of items seized in the raids on six Sydney Indonesian families in the aftermath of the Bali bombings.

Six months after heavily armed ASIO and federal police agents launched the first lightning raids, the Indonesian community remains under the watchful eye of Australia's spy agency.

"I'm constantly being informally approached by 'friends of friends' seeking advice on speaking to ASIO," says lawyer Stephen Hopper, who represents the six raided Indonesian families.

"Mostly, they've known someone who has been raided and they've been asked to answer questions about their association. They ask me about their friend's rights and I tell them they have a right to have a lawyer present at the interview. I rarely hear from them after that."

One ASIO informant, a leading member of the Indonesian community, said he had coffee with ASIO agents only a few weeks ago. They spoke of the war in Iraq and Jemaah Islamiah (JI). "Always it is the same names they ask about."

One of those names is the Perth-based Muslim convert Jack Roche, accused of plotting to blow up Israeli diplomatic posts in Australia. Another is Abdul Rahim Ayub, who avoided ASIO's dragnet when he fled Australia within weeks of the October 12 attacks. "They say they want information for the case. I tell them the same thing: I know them but we weren't friends," the informant says.

ASIO isn't the only authority still interested in Sydney's Indonesian community.

Indonesian leaders have counted 32 of their community detained in the Villawood detention centre in Immigration Department swoops over the past several weeks. They are convinced it is part of a wider strategy of humiliation and intimidation.

In fact, department figures show 255 Indonesians have been found in breach of visa conditions or illegal in Australia since last October's bombings. But in the well-publicised hunt for terrorist cells since then, not one person from the six raided families has been charged.

And a few weeks ago, in what the families consider an act of exoneration, ASIO returned computer discs, documents and mobile phones and videos seized in the raids. About 150 items wrapped in numbered exhibit bags were signed back to the owners at Bankstown police station. They included videos of lectures given by the Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, JI's alleged spiritual leader.

At an official level, ASIO and the AFP maintain good relations with Muslim leaders. But at the grassroots, observers say, the raids have been counter-productive, entrenching suspicion and heightening the community's sense of otherness, its siege mentality.

A Muslim leader who admits to infrequent contact with federal police said: "After those raids, everybody immediately threw out their tapes [of Bashir]. They were scared they would be next to be raided." The secretary of the Dee Why mosque, Romzi Ali, protests the innocence of his community, which he says has retreated into silence since the raids. "Within our people, we don't trust each other. We don't speak of sensitive issues. We do not know who is friend, who isn't friend." The six families complain they have been ostracised within their community on the slimmest of suspicions and will probably never be able to properly clear their names.

The director of terrorism studies at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at Australian National University, Clive Williams, said the raids did not necessarily point to the innocence, or guilt, of the families. "Nobody was arrested apart from Jack Roche and clearly there wasn't sufficient evidence to hold them. They have to be regarded ... as innocent at this stage. That's not to say there wasn't something that amounted to suspicion." But he agreed the raids could undermine ASIO's quest for information. "What you want to do is keep the community on side and establish an informant network. The raids underlined the Government's seriousness, but then there is always the potential to alienate a section of the community."

1,000 students demand release of Ba'asyir

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2003

Solo -- About 1,000 protesting Islamic students Monday demanded the release of Abu Bakar Ba'asyir -- the alleged leader of the al-Qaida-linked group Jama'ah Islamiyah -- who is to face trial for treason this week.

The students held a noisy but peaceful demonstration outside a courthouse in the central Javanese city of Solo, 600 kilometers east of Jakarta, and near their boarding school that was founded by Ba'asyir, a Muslim cleric.

"Release our teacher, he is innocent," said of their banners. "Indonesia has been pressured by terrorist America." Policemen outside the court building took no action against the peaceful protest, Associated Press reported.

Ba'asyir is slated to go on trial in Jakarta on Wednesday. Authorities accuse him of being behind the bombings of 38 churches in Indonesian on Christmas Eve 2000, in which 19 people were killed. They also allege he plotted to destabilize thegovernment.

Ba'asyir has said he is innocent and that he is the victim of a US conspiracy against Muslim activists. If convicted he could be imprisoned for life.

Jama'ah Islamiyah members are separately accused in the October 12 bombings on the resort island of Bali, which killed 202 people, mostly foreign tourists. Police have not directly linked Bashir to that mass murder.

Government & politics

Eros changes his party's name

Jakarta Post - April 26, 2003

Jakarta -- Eros Djarot announced on Friday a new name for his Bung Karno Nationalist Party (PNBK) during the party's two-day leadership meeting here.

The party has been renamed the Banteng Kemerdekaan Nationalist Party, allowing the party to maintain its original acronym.

The change was recommended because the party's symbol was identical to another party's and it was named after a person, which is in violation of the political party law.

To refute public doubt about the party's eligibility to contest the 2004 elections, party chairman Eros said the leadership meeting was attended by representatives of 26 provincial chapters. He added that his party was ready to contest the elections, and set a target of winning at least 5 percent of the vote.

The party is one of a few splinter groups of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle.

Parties seek closed presidential race

Jakarta Post - April 26, 2003

Kurniawan Hari, Jakarta -- The opportunity for Indonesians to vote for candidates of their choice in the 2004 presidential election is under threat, as the two largest factions in the House of Representatives have sought to limit the number of parties participating in the election.

The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan), the largest faction, and Golkar, second-largest, have submitted separately suggestions to the House special commission currently deliberating the presidential elections bill.

PDI Perjuangan, headed by President Megawati Soekarnoputri, has suggested that only parties and coalitions that garner 20 percent or more of legislature seats may field candidates in the first- ever direct presidential election in 2004. If endorsed, there will be five presidential candidates at the most in 2004.

Golkar, on the other hand, has proposed that only parties that win 35 percent or more of legislature seats can nominate candidates. This means there would be only two presidential candidates contesting the election.

PDI Perjuangan has 153 seats, or almost 34 percent of the 500- member House, while Golkar has 120, or 24 percent of House seats. The TNI/police faction, which has 38 members, has thrown its support behind PDI Perjuangan.

Other large political parties -- the National Awakening Party (PKB), United Development Party (PPP) and National Mandate Party (PAN) -- have also submitted suggestions and called for the scrapping of any limitation.

The bill, drafted by the Ministry of Home Affairs, states that only parties, or coalitions of parties, winning 20 percent of the votes in the legislative election, should be allowed to run for the presidency.

Some small political parties have opposed the limitation, accusing PDI Perjuangan and Golkar of trying to strengthen their grip on power by shutting out other political parties.

Agun Gunandjar Sudarsa of Golkar defended the limitation, saying that the move did not necessarily amount to a restriction on the rights of political parties. Agun added that the stricter limitation would prompt political parties to form coalitions.

The list of suggestions submitted by political parties also deals with academic requirements for presidential candidates. All but PDI Perjuangan proposed that presidential candidates should be university graduates. PDI Perjuangan, on the other hand, suggested that a senior high school graduate could run for the country's top post. PDI Perjuangan chairwoman, Megawati, does not have a university degree.

The Golkar faction, meanwhile, rejected a stipulation in the bill that a criminal suspect or convict in a crime that carried a jail sentence of more than five years should not be allowed to contest the presidential election. According to Golkar legislators, whose chairman Akbar Tandjung was sentenced to three years in jail for corruption involving the State Logistics Agency, banning such a person from being nominated would contradict human rights principles.

Commenting on the wrangling, political analyst and expert adviser to the home ministry Cecep Effendi said on Friday that there was nothing wrong with the arguments of House factions. "Political parties are formed to accommodate the aspirations of their supporters. It is normal for those factions to fight for their interests," Cecep said at a discussion here on Friday. Although Cecep did not see the contention as a serious problem, leaders of House factions denied that they were merely fighting for their own vested interests.

Zaenal Arifin, of PDI Perjuangan, acknowledged that party interests from each faction were expressed during deliberations on the presidential elections bill. "That was inevitable," Zaenal added.

'Slow and messy' run-up to Jakarta polls

Straits Times - April 25, 2003

Devi Asmarani, Jakarta -- With less than a year left before Indonesia conducts unprecedented direct elections, the slow, messy preparations are already sparking concerns of possible irregularities when the polls are held.

The General Election on April 5 next year would be the first of its kind in the country. Parliament endorsed a Bill in February that adopts a new electoral system to elect legislators. This new system calls for a redefinition of electoral areas, which were traditionally divided into cities, regencies and provinces.

The independent body which runs the elections, the KPU or General Election Committee, will define these new electoral areas based on a voter registration process being conducted by the State Statistics Agency (BPS) this month.

After the electoral areas are determined, the political parties can submit their candidates for parliament and regional legislatures for KPU approval.

But the registration process has posed the biggest challenge to KPU. BPS, which has deployed some 230,000 bureaucrats and community leaders to carry out the massive census, has admitted that progress is slow. It says it might need to extend the period by at least two weeks.

The process has been hindered by a lack of registration forms, public awareness and public acceptance. The officers doing the census work are also ill-trained.

Given only seven months to prepare the campaign, KPU has little time to raise public awareness of the process. Many households have thus been surprised by the visiting officers.

Registering voters has been hampered because people take time to produce required documents such as family registration cards, identity cards and birth or marriage certificates.

Further complicating the process is that residents in some areas are being told by their religious leaders to boycott the process as an expression of dissatisfaction with the current political leaders. In areas where anti-government sentiment runs high, such as Aceh and Irian Jaya, some residents have been too suspicious to cooperate.

In addition, the slow disbursement of funds and a lack of qualified people are making it hard for KPU to meet a May deadline for setting up some 400 offices across provinces, regencies and cities to implement and oversee the election process.

The KPU decided to hold the legislative elections two months earlier than originally planned in June to avoid a situation in which a new president is not in place after the incumbent president vacates the post in October of the election year.

This is because the first ever direct presidential election would probably be held separately after the legislative polls. It will be held in two stages if none of the candidates get more than 51 per cent of the vote.

This means the massive logistics of running and tabulating three sets of elections with approximately 130 million voters must be done in a matter of months.

Mr Hadar Gumay of the Centre for Electoral Reform, a non- governmental organisation campaigning for a fair electoral system, told The Straits Times: "The schedule is too tight, it does not allow room for mistakes. With the low level of competency of the electoral officials, and with KPU being ill- equipped and under-funded, this election could be marred by rigged results." For example, he said, in other countries, it takes up to three years to define electoral areas.

By contrast, the KPU is only allotted five months to determine some 1,500 new electoral areas across the country based on the results of the registration process. Failure to come up with the most proportional electoral districts can provide unfair advantages for certain political parties, he said.

'Bill shuts out alternative presidential candidates'

Jakarta Post - April 23, 2003

Jakarta -- Prodemocracy activists, analysts and mass media are certainly not the only ones longing for the emergence of a strong, fair and wise national leader to bring the nation out of its prolonged crisis, uphold justice and build peace.

The general public and those living in conflict-ridden regions equally wish for strong leadership, but their wish is likely not to become a reality anytime soon as the current administration and the political factions at the House of Representatives (DPR) are in a heated debate about how presidential candidates contending the 2004 general election should be limited to as few as possible.

Two main arguments have emerged from the current deliberation of the presidential election bill, sparking criticism from political analysts and prodemocracy activists. The first is whether the legislative election should be held at the same time as the presidential election, while the second is whether presidential candidates should be limited.

The multiparty government preparing the bill has proposed that the legislative election and the presidential election be held separately and that there is a limit put on the number of presidential candidates running in the election. Only political parties winning 20 percent of the seats in the legislature are allowed to nominate presidential candidates.

The Indonesian Democratic Party for Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) and the Golkar Party, two major factions in the legislative body, have thrown their weight behind the bill, saying that the two proposals were aimed at maintaining a check-and-balance system as well as the election's efficiency and effectiveness.

The bill, especially those two contentions, has drawn protests from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and political analysts as well as creating strong opposition from minority political parties allowed to nominate presidential candidates.

They are questioning what the coalition government and major parties have in mind to win the presidential election and maintain their status quo.

Sjahrir, the chairman of the New Indonesia Party (PIB), and Ryaas Rasyid, the chairman of the National Democratic Party, broke the bill down into sections, accusing the current administration of being unwilling to have new faces emerge to lead the country.

Angry with the possibility of limited presidential candidates, Amien Rais, the chairman of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) and the chairman of the National Mandate Party (PAN), a minority faction at the House, has successfully lobbied the United Development Party (PPP) and the Crescent Star Party (PBB) to reject the two chapters, which he said would certainly undermine democracy.

Amien, who is preparing to run in the presidential election, has instructed his party faction to fight for holding both elections at the same time and not limiting the number of presidential candidates.

Chapter Six of the amended 1945 Constitution stipulates that presidential and vice presidential candidates are nominated by political parties or a coalition of parties declared eligible for the general election.

"To generate efficiency, the presidential election [the first round] should be held simultaneously with the legislative election because there will be two rounds in the presidential election," he said.

Aberson Marle Sihaloho, a senior member of PDI Perjuangan, hailed the planned direct presidential election, which he has long fought for.

"With the bill's two contentious chapters, PDI Perjuangan, Golkar and the military are strongly trying to intervene, if not take over, the people's right to elect their own president through a direct election, which looks inevitable for 2004," he said.

He said the coalition administration and major parties were implementing two scenarios to maintain the status quo.

"First, major parties [PDI Perjuangan and Golkar] want to limit presidential candidates so that only two parties plus several minority ones would be allowed to nominate candidates. That way, the people can only elect a president from the candidates proposed by the major faction. The two parties are eying widely accepted figures from the Muhammadiyah and the Nadhlatul Ulama (NU), two large Muslim organizations, to win the hearts of people.

"Second, a ruling that the presidential election be held two or three months after the legislative election would give the next MPR numerous reasons to postpone the direct presidential election by saying that the people were not ready for it while the security condition in some regions would not be conducive," he said, adding that according to Chapter Three, the MPR had the authority to review the Constitution.

The idea of a direct presidential election has raised fears of the past regime of former president Soeharto, the military and the current administration.

KPU admits to flaws in registration process

Jakarta Post - April 23, 2003

Arya Abhiseka, Jakarta -- The General Elections Commission (KPU) admitted on Tuesday that many flaws were evident in the voter registration process as revealed by a resistance to the program in some regions.

Chairman of the KPU Nazaruddin Sjamsuddin said he had received reports on some individuals who claimed their right to submit an unmarked ballot during the upcoming general elections by refusing to be registered by field officers from the Central Bureau of Statistics (BPS).

"It is not a problem if an individual chooses to exercise their right to leave their ballot empty on election day. However, the voter registration process is also being used to take the national census, through which citizens will be registered and given their identity number," he said.

Agus Suherman, the head of the national census and the voter registration process, told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday that some resistance to the program had occurred in the West Java regency of Garut and several areas in East Java.

In those areas, Agus said, religious leaders had suggested their followers to boycott the voter registration as an expression of their dissatisfaction with current political practices.

Agus said the public's refusal to be registered resulted from lack of public information on the voter registration process.

"It [the registration] is also taking the national census. It is unpolitical, and the people must comply if they still want their Indonesian citizenship," he said.

Nazaruddin said that the public misunderstood the difference between exercising their individual rights and submitting to the voter registration procedure, which was instrumental to their personal administrative needs.

He explained further that if an individual did not have an identity number, there was a great possibility that they would be denied issue of an identification card, a driver's license, a marriage license, a passport or a visa.

The negative response to the registration also showed that preparations for the upcoming elections were uncoordinated. The voter registration process had been hindered by a lack of registration forms, field officers, public awareness and public acceptance.

Many have criticized the KPU on the poor awareness campaign for the general elections process, which could lead to public misinformation and misconceptions.

Safder Yussac, secretary general of the KPU, said on Tuesday that his institution had budgeted properly for the general elections awareness campaign, but that time constraints had prevented it from setting up a proper campaign.

"We budgeted some Rp 1.5 billion [US$169,539] for the awareness campaign. However, we had only two weeks before April 1 to plan a proper campaign, as a result of the prolonged deliberation of election bill," he explained.

The House of Representatives endorsed the election bill on February 18 this year, leaving the KPU with only seven weeks to develop up a public service announcement, print and disburse voter registration forms and register voters, from April 1 to April 30.

The country's first direct general election will take place on April 5, 2003, and will be followed by a two-stage presidential election between June and August, in which some 130 million voters are expected to participate.

Corruption/collusion/nepotism

Officials pilfer rice for the poor

Jakarta Post - April 26, 2003

Bogor -- Thirteen village chiefs in Jasinga district of Bogor regency have admitted to selling 88.42 tons of rice designated for poor families.

Adj. Comr. Yayan Sopyan of the Bogor Police said the village heads told police interrogators on Wednesday that they had sold the rice to a trader in Cipinang rice market in East Jakarta after consulting with an official of Jasinga district, Aep Supaat.

Aep, head of the social affairs unit, reportedly told them to sell the rice to the trader at a profit of Rp 400 per kilogram. The village heads were required to share the profit with Aep. Each village head reportedly received an average of Rp 2 million.

In an effort to alleviate poverty, the government has introduced a rice for the poor program. Under the program, poor people are entitled to buy the rice for Rp 1,000 per kilogram, which is much lower than the market price.

Separately, head of the Bogor Audit Agency, Muammal Soelaiman, said that an investigation had revealed that Aep had committed "undisciplined" deeds because he had distributed the rice not in accordance with procedure.

Suharto's half-brother jailed for corruption

Agence France Presse - April 23, 2003

Jakarta -- An Indonesian court yesterday sentenced a half-brother of former president Suharto to four years' jail for corruption involving US$11.4 million in state funds.

Probosutejo, who was head of a timber company, failed to repay interest-free loans from a state reforestation fund totalling 100.9 billion rupiah, Judge Mohammad Soleh ruled.

Probosutejo, 72, who seemed dazed by the verdict, was allowed to remain free pending his appeal because the judge said he had been cooperative. He was also fined 30 million rupiah (S$6,600) and ordered to repay the loans.

Suharto's family and associates amassed billions of dollars through lucrative monopolies or outright corruption during his 32-year rule which ended in 1998.

Some close cronies or family members have since been brought to justice. Suharto's younger son Tommy was convicted of murder last year and sentenced to 15 years' jail.

Media/press freedom

'Law hampers press freedom'

Jakarta Post - April 26, 2003

Evi Mariani, Jakarta -- Press Council vice chairman R.H. Siregar says loopholes in press law No. 40/1999 hamper freedom of the press in Indonesia by treating journalists as criminals.

Speaking at a discussion on freedom of the press here on Thursday, Siregar said that Article 12 of the law stated that, in some cases, journalists and members of the media could be processed according to the Criminal Code.

"It is better to fine or ban journalists who are suspected of violating the law from reporting, rather than imprisoning them." The recent case involving Tempo magazine and businessman Tommy Winata has led Tempo's Bambang Harymurti and Ahmad Taufik to be charged under Article 310 of the Criminal Code on defamation and Article 311 on libel, which carry maximum punishments of nine months and four years in prison, respectively.

Police also stated earlier this month that both had violated Article 5(1) of the press law on the media's obligation to respect religious norms and public decency, as well as to adhere to the principle of presumption of innocence. The article carries a maximum fine of Rp 500 million (US$56,179).

Siregar questioned the term "presumption of innocence". "What does it really mean? There is no explanation in the law to define that abstract term." He also said that besides the press law, the state, society and journalists themselves could hamper press freedom.

Journalist Cyrillus Kerong of Bisnis Indonesia daily presented a critique of the press during the seminar. "We should admit that journalists sometimes disregard ethics in reporting. Because of tight deadlines and a lack of concern, journalists often prepare news stories sloppily." Siregar underlined Kerong's statement, saying that negligence by journalists could lead to libel indictments that might bring the press to the brink of bankruptcy.

"I remember one daily newspaper was accused of libel and was looking at have to pay Rp 400 billion (about US$45 million). They would have been bankrupt if they had had to pay that amount." Attendants at the seminar also discussed concerns raised by the people that the national press was promoting anarchism and thuggery with its unbalanced and negligent reporting.

However, Taufik, who also addressed the seminar, said that in Tempo's case the people who attacked the magazine's office in Central Jakarta in early March were not true representatives of society. "In my eyes, they were 'fabricated society'. They brought fire trucks with them, so I would have to conclude that the attack was well-prepared, not spontaneous," he said.

Regional/communal conflicts

Maluku remains calm following RMS anniversary

Jakarta Post - April 27, 2003

Jakarta -- The situation in Maluku is calm following the separatist South Maluku Republic (RMS)'s 53rd anniversary on Friday, which saw the arrest of more than 300 supporters of the outlawed group.

It was business as usual on Saturday in traditional markets and shopping centers, including those in Ambon, the provincial capital, and Central Maluku, a stronghold of the RMS. Students attended classes as normal, though troops and police officers were deployed in strategic areas of Ambon.

Three more RMS flags were seized on Saturday by security authorities in the villages of Karang Panjang, Nania and Halong Baru in Ambon municipality. The flags had been hung on trees by RMS supporters.

Security authorities arrested about 300 people on Friday, mostly from Aboru in Central Maluku, for raising RMS flags and holding gatherings to mark the RMS' anniversary. Those arrested will be given the opportunity to renounce their support for the RMS. Those who refuse to do so could face charges of subversion and holding illegal meetings.

Police in Ambon are having difficulty finding room for the 300 detainees. Ambon Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. Teguh Budi Prasojo said the detention block at the police station was unable to accommodate the nearly 250 detainees from Central Maluku.

"Some of the detainees will be put in the detention house at the local military base because the police only have four detention cells," he said.

Maluku Governor Sinyo Harry Sarundajang said his administration would investigate the detainees to determine who among them were true separatists. "It is possible that some of the detainees are not actually RMS supporters, but are only disappointed with the government for other reasons," he said. He said that many residents of the village of Aboru were dissatisfied with the government for its failure to build roads and other facilities in their village.

Sarundajang promised to try and satisfy the villagers' demand for improved infrastructure, and asked the police and the military to help develop the road network in the regency.

60 arrested to suppress RMS anniversary celebration

Jakarta Post - April 26, 2003

Jakarta -- Indonesian troops and police have arrested about 60 people to quell attempts to mark a separatist anniversary on Friday in the eastern Maluku islands.

The detainees had either sewn or flown flags of the outlawed Republic of South Maluku which were to be hoisted on Friday, said Ambon island district military commander, Lieutenant Colonel Yudi Zanibar.

"The group was arrested in several parts of the island. Many of them quietly raised the flags late last night on hilltops and trees," he told AFP by telephone.

He said a home-made bomb exploded in the Rinjani area of Ambon island butthere were no casualties or damage.

Troops in the Maluku provincial capital Ambon have been searching residents for weapons or flags. A helicopter on Monday dropped leaflets over the city warning that any attempt to celebrate the anniversary is banned.

An extra 400 police are being deployed in Ambon and Haruku island to suppress any attempt to mark the anniversary in 1950 of the proclamation of the republic, Friday's Jakarta Post reported.

People loyal to Dutch colonial rule declared the Republic of South Maluku in 1950 and staged a revolt against newly independent Indonesia.

RMS flags found hoisted in Ambon

Jakarta Post - April 25, 2003

Ambon -- Police have found five flags of the separatist Republic of South Maluku (RMS) hoisted in different areas here.

"Two flags were found hoisted on a 7-meter bamboo pole," local police chief Adjunct Senior Commissioner Teguh Budi Prasodjo told Antara here on Thursday.

Two flags were found in Nusawine subdistrict, one in a sports hall in Sirimau subdistrict, and one in senior high school, SMU IV Lateri, in Baguala subdistrict.

No one has been arrested over the hoisting of the separatist movement's flag, he said, adding that air patrols, which began on Wednesday, would continue.

National Police have warned it would take stern measures against those marking the anniversary of the RMS here on Friday.

Police arrest seven suspected RMS members

Jakarta Post - April 21, 2003

Jakarta -- Police in Maluku province arrested seven suspected separatists on Sunday during a dawn raid on a house in the provincial capital of Ambon, police said.

The seven were detained for holding an illegal meeting at the house of a man identified as Jhony Rea to discuss plans to hoist the separatist South Maluku Republic (RMS) flag on theorganization's 53rd anniversary on April 25, Maluku Police Chief Brig. Gen. Bambang Sutrisno said.

Sutrisno was quoted by Antara as saying that the police had been watching Rea's house for days before the raid was launched. He said that some documents were found in the house and they were currently being studied by the police but he declined to give more details.

Authorities have issued warnings against anyone raising the RMS flag on April 25. They have spoken of stern measures against anyone taking part in such a subversive activity.

Human rights/law

Activist stands trial for insulting Megawati

Jakarta Post - April 22, 2003

M. Taufiqurrahman, Jakarta -- An activist from the radical group Islamic Youth Movement (GPI) was on trial on Monday for allegedly insulting President Megawati Soekarnoputri during an antigovernment protest in mid-February.

The defendant, M. Iqbal Siregar, was charged with violating Article 134 of the Criminal Code, which relates to the intentional insult of the president or vice president, and carries a maximum penalty of six year's imprisonment. He was also accused of violating Article 137 (1) on publicizing such behavior, which carries a maximum penalty of one year in jail.

The article is known here as a pasal karet (catchall article), because in the past, the New Order regime drew upon it to suppress its political opponents.

The indictment, read by chief prosecutor Arnold Angkouw, said that during an antigovernment protest on January 15, the defendant carried a picture of Megawati that had black tape over her eyes and the words "Hunted by the public" imprinted on top.

"He then showed the picture to the crowd, saying, 'this is the President who has disappointed citizens'," Arnold said, adding that the defendant then threw the pictures onto busy Jl. Merdeka Utara, Central Jakarta, for them to be run over by vehicles. The chief prosecutor said that such an act constituted an intentional insult of the President.

Iqbal carried out the act during a protest against a number of Megawati administration policies, which, he said, had added to the plight of the populace. The rally was also attended by other groups, including the Islamic Students Association (HMI), the Alliance Against Mega (ATM) and the Jakarta Student Executive Bodies (BEM).

The trial for Iqbal was the third to be held in the country during Megawati's term as president. Late last year, Muzakkir and Nanang Mamija, respectively from the Populist Youth Movement (GPK) and the National Farmers Federation (STN), were sentenced to one year in prison after being proven guilty of stamping on pictures of Megawati and Vice President Hamzah Haz.

Currently, the trials of three student activists, Rico Marbun, Fathul Nugroho and Ardy Purnawanani, accused of insulting state leaders, are still under way.

Moments before presiding judge Cornel Sianturi concluded the hearing, the defendants' lawyer, Taufik Basari, said that the team of advocates would submit a case for the defense. The judge later agreed that it could be heard on Thursday.

After the hearing was over, Iqbal -- who had been in custody for 80 days, the last time in Salemba prison, Central Jakarta -- said that his trial was but one example of how the Megawati administration was following the path of the authoritarian regime of former president Soeharto in using the catchall article to curb protests against his government.

"These articles [134 and 137] will simply kill off the country's burgeoning democracy," Iqbal said. Citing that the trial could become a bad precedent for the prodemocracy movement in the future, he said: "If the articles are strictly applied, thousands of our young, opposed to government policy, will crowd the country's prisons." Reiterating Iqbal's statement, Taufik said that the use of catchall articles against political activists showed that the Megawati administration was indeed a repressive regime.

Jakarta court seeks jail without trial in contempt cases

Straits Times - April 22, 2003

Jakarta -- In a bid to secure its "dignity and honour" the Supreme Court is considering imprisonment without trial for people deemed to be in contempt.

Senior court officer Susanti Adi Nugroho has suggested jailing without trial anyone -- including lawyers and police -- who does not pay due respect to the court and its proceedings. Currently, contempt cases have to go through an investigative and judicial process before an offender can be jailed.

Mr Susanti"s proposal defines contempt as 'conduct within and outside the court, which may threaten or assault the court's honour, including physical assault committed by someone in the presence of the court as well as defamation against the court's judges." He suggests journalists and media be charged with contempt if they publish one-sided, subjective news that is judgmental of court proceedings.

They would get the same treatment if they criticised judges' private lives or condemned one party in a case so as to prejudice fair trial. Mr Susanti, head of the Supreme Court's research and development division, said journalists could also be charged for taking pictures in court without permission.

His proposals follow a survey involving 611 judges in district, religious, state administrative and military courts. Most said they had suffered some form of physical or verbal abuse from lawyers, defendants, visitors or other parties involved in hearings. "We have yet to discuss it with the press but that is the guideline," Mr Susanti said.

News & issues

Indonesia seeks UN Human Rights Commission membership

Jakarta Post - April 23, 2003

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jakarta -- Indonesia is seeking one of the 53 seats on the United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) for 2003-2004, hoping that its own poor human rights track record will not count against it.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Marty Natalegawa, said on Tuesday that despite its shortcomings, Indonesia deserved the nomination because it was a recognized democracy. "Though we admit there were many flaws in the past, we are a democratic nation and it would be an advantage for us to sit on the commission," Marty told The Jakarta Post.

He said Jakarta would not allow East Timor and all the rights abuses committed there deter it from seeking membership to the main UN rights watchdog. "It is a fact that we had human rights violations in East Timor in the past, but we are a new Indonesia and we have the democratic credentials," Marty said. He added that membership on the commission would help bolster human rights back home in Indonesia.

Indonesia is among several countries seeking seats on the UNHRC in an election scheduled for next week. The election next week will coincide with the commission's decision to drop from its agenda the matter of the post-referendum violence that took place in East Timor in 1999, for which several Indonesian Military officers have been implicated.

Indonesia's permanent representative in Geneva, Switzerland, Nugroho Wisnumurti, would be the country's representative to the rights commission should it win its bid. Other countries with poor human rights records such as North Korea, Iran and Nigeria are also seeking seats on the rights commission.

"Indonesia would like to underline human rights as one of the pillar of democracy and also would like to disseminate the code of human rights for our own domestic interests," Marty said.

Meanwhile, Deutsche Press-Agentur reported that human rights organizations are protesting the inclusion of countries with some of the worst records of abuses on a list of candidates for election to the rights commission.

North Korea, Iran and Nigeria are likely to win membership to the commission. Egypt is another candidate and, even though its abuses are not on the same scale as the other countries, it has been conducting a vigorous campaign against homosexuals.

Other members seeking election this year are Eritrea, Mauritania, Bhutan, Cambodia, Nepal, Qatar, Hungary, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Italy, the Netherlands and Portugal. Seeking reelection are Britain, Costa Rica, Guatemala, India, Peru, South Africa and Thailand.

Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are among the organizations complaining that the inclusion of these countries makes a mockery of the organization, and are urging reform of the process. The New York-based Human Rights Watch described the list of candidate countries as "a Who's Who of the worst human rights abusers".

The body has a membership of 53, each member serving a two-year term. It catalogs human rights abuses, investigates claims and puts pressure on governments to change. A group of countries with poor records can block or slow the work of the commission.

Amnesty International said it would like to see a benchmark set for membership: each candidate would have to ratify guarantees of basic human rights and open its borders to investigators.

Melinda Ching, a spokeswoman for Amnesty, said that without such a benchmark, the signal being sent out was that the commission "lures those countries that have been under the body's spotlight -- North Korea, Iran -- into gaining membership to the UN's supreme human rights body for the very purpose of deflecting criticism of each other's human rights situations".

No place for separatist movements in Indonesia: Yudhoyono

Jakarta Post - April 23, 2003

Jakarta -- Coordinating Minister for Security and Political Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono reiterated here on Wednesday that there is no place for separatist movements in the country -- in Aceh, Papua or Maluku.

"The government's stance is very clear -- it will not tolerate a separatist movement, in Ambon [Maluku], Aceh or Papua," Susilo said after a coordination meeting on political and security affairs, as quoted by Antara.

The minister was responding to a proposal by the separatist South Maluku Republic (RMS) to commemorate its anniversary on April 25. The government, he said, had done its best to stop separatist movements, while fulfilling the aspirations of the people.

"If the problems concern justice, economic welfare, health and education, of course we shall address them. But there is no place for movements that aim to secede [from Indonesia]," he noted.

Susilo said he had instructed the governor, military and police chiefs of Maluku to anticipate moves to revive the RMS. "I have communicated with them so that the local administration can take appropriate measures that are not counterproductive," he said.

The RMS is reportedly planning to hoist its flag in commemoration of its anniversary on April 25. Indonesian Military (TNI) chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto, however, issued a clear warning that the military would act firmly against anyone who tried to hoist the separatist movement's flag.

Bali/tourism

SARS deals double blow to Bali tourism revival

Reuters - April 23, 2003

Gde Anugrah Arka, Bali -- Made Suarsa's minibus is almost empty these days as he winds through the narrow streets of Denpasar, capital of one of the world's best-known travel destinations, Bali.

The minibus often used to be packed with tourists from among the Australian surfers, Japanese honeymooners and international celebrities who flocked to the island of long, white sand beaches, towering volcanoes, and lush vegetation.

That was before last October's nightclub bombings on Kuta Beach -- blamed on Muslim militants -- that killed 202 people, mostly foreigners, and the more recent impact on regional travel from the deadly SARS virus.

Made, a Balinese Hindu in his 50's and already a grandfather several times over, tries to be philosophical about the drop in his business and that of others reliant on the tourist trade. "Maybe we have to look at our karma, look at things that have gone wrong," he says.

But others in Bali, where 70 percent of the population directly or indirectly depends on tourism for their survival, are more pragmatic about ways to get visitors and their money back to "Paradise Island".

Before the bomb blasts, tourism was bringing Indonesia some $5 billion a year, with Bali accounting for about 35 percent of the total.

Don Birch, who heads leading Asian travel information and reservation services provider Abacus International, said Bali was beginning to recover after the bombings through low-cost packages and promotional campaigns to boost its image.

Hotels and airlines have made a concerted effort to provide travellers with "cost-effective packages" designed to jump start Bali's tourism business, he told a regional tourism meeting in Bali this week.

"Once the tourism industry partners in Bali showed the world that safety and security precautions were in place and government advisories were removed, travellers returned," Birch said.

Sars scare

In the last few weeks, however, Bali has had to deal with a new problem, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).

SARS, which has been spread around the world by travellers, has infected at least 4,000 people and killed more than 230 people in 25 countries in the last six weeks, after first showing up in southern China in November.

While Indonesia has yet to confirm any cases, important sources of tourism for the sprawling archipelago such as Singapore and Hong Kong have been hit hard, and many Westerners are simply avoiding Asian travel altogether.

"SARS is the biggest problem, more than anything else now," said Julita Chandra, marketing communications manager at five star Hotel Nusa Dua Beach. "If it is not resolved the outlook for hotels here will continue to be gloomy."

Before SARS emerged, Bali tourist arrival growth was accelerating from the lows hit just after the bombings in late October and early November, when occupancy percentages at many hotels were measured in single digits.

Arrivals in February, for example, were down around 28 percent from the same month a year earlier, compared to a 56 percent year-on-year drop in November. Last year the island recorded 1.35 million tourist arrivals.

At this week's tourism conference, industry leaders said they would also try to fight the impact of terrorism and SARS by being honest about problems while publicising progress in dealing with issues such as security and disease.

Baliphiles

Some pin their hopes on "Baliphiles", those so in love with the island they return year after year, and domestic tourists, for whom SARS and possible anti-Western violence are not issues and the bargain prices of recent months are hard to resist.

Australian Vern Cork is one of the Baliphiles. A retired teacher who has visited Bali annually for more than 20 years, he likes spending months every year in picturesque Ubud, with its hills, trees and running streams.

He says his time in Ubud, considered the island's cultural capital and centre for traditional artists, has been an enlightening experience so profound it helped him recover from a Parkinson's-like disease. "The culture is so rich. It is peaceful here. And despite all the bad news, I am getting better here in Bali," Cork says.

Visitors willing to bargain hard can get sea-front rooms in some five-star hotels for well under $100 a day. Car rentals are down more than 25 percent from a year ago, and many restaurants offer 50 percent off menu prices.

For roadside food seller Made Sujana, such steps cannot bring recovery soon enough. "I earn 20,000 rupiah ($2.20) a day, a third of what I got before the bombings," he said.

"I have two kids at school and I haven't paid my rent for two months. I read it might take six months more to recover, by which time my landlord may have already kicked us out."

Islam/religion

Indonesia militant turns himself in - prosecutor

Reuters - April 21, 2003

Jakarta -- An Indonesian Muslim militant turned himself in to authorities on Monday after supporters had spirited him out of police custody, a prosecutor said.

Habib Rizieq, who once urged Indonesians to take over the US embassy if the United States should attack Iraq, presented himself shortly after 5pm, Mulyoharjo, head of the Jakarta attorney-general's office, told Reuters. "He was received by prosecutors," Mulyoharjo said. "His status now is prosecutors' detainee." At mid-day about 50 supporters, far outnumbering police at the scene, had pushed Rizieq from inside the prosecutor's office to a bus waiting outside.

Rizieq's Islamic Defenders' Front (FPI) has raided establishments it believed were acting against Indonesian law and Islamic principles, and tried to sign up volunteers to go to Afghanistan and Iraq to fight the United States.

Police detained him late last year over some of the raids. But local media said despite being under house arrest Rizieq left Indonesia for the Middle East this month to help resist the US- led attack, and was picked up by authorities late on Sunday upon returning to Jakarta on a flight from Malaysia.

Rizieq said he was not trying to escape when he left the country. "My trip overseas was not to escape from responsibilities. I was not escaping from the law," he told supporters and media before giving himself up.

Before the war on Iraq, Rizieq had said the FPI was "campaigning for the public to besiege and take over the US embassy if war broke out", and that if there was a war, "We will have thousands of new Osama bin Ladens who will be ready to destroy US facilities".

Prosecutors and lawyers say Rizieq faces several charges, including provocation leading to violence.

[Reporting by Telly Nathalia.]

Supporters grab Shihab to prevent him going to jail

Agence France Presse - April 21, 2003

Dozens of supporters of a hardline Indonesian Muslim cleric snatched him from prosecutors and spirited him away shortly before he was due to be taken to jail, reports said.

Dozens of white-clad members of the Front for the Defenders of Islam (FPI) stormed into the poorly guarded lobby of the prosecutors' office and grabbed Habib Mohammed Rizieq Shihab from officials about to take him to Salemba state jail. Shihab is due to face trial over a series of attacks by his followers on Jakarta nightspots and bars.

Police earlier Monday had transferred Shihab from their headquarters to the prosecutors' office to hand him over in preparation for his trial. But at the office some 50 noisy supporters grabbed their leader and commandeered a passing public minibus to take them to FPI headquarters, SCTV television showed.

Police and officials were powerless to prevent the incident, the television said. "It was beyond our expectations ... this is a spontaneous incident," FPI secretary general Ahmad Sobri Lubis told the television shortly afterwards.

He said the supporters "were hysterical and showed signs of preparedness to fight. We [FPI leaders] deemed that it would be unwise to resist their efforts at that moment." Lubis said Shihab was currently resting at FPI headquarters and would surrender himself later after supporters calmed down.

Shihab, who left the country earlier this month for what his lawyers called a "humanitarian mission" to Iraq, was met by police when he flew home Sunday night. Local media said he arrived from Jordan but it was not clear if he had entered Iraq. He was kept at police headquarters overnight in preparation for the handover to prosecutors.

Shihab has been declared a suspect in inciting violence, expressing enmity against the government, destroying private property and attacks on individuals. The charges can carry up to seven years in jail.

He had been detained under city arrest since late last year as part of a crackdown on Islamic hardliners following the Bali bombings last October 12. Shihab is not suspected of any role in the bombings but is accused of instigating violence during a series of raids in which FPI members smashed up pool halls and bars in Jakarta.

After the US-led attacks on Iraq began, the FPI launched a drive to sign up volunteers to fight alongside the Iraqis. It was not clear if anyone actually left the country.

Shihab was held in detention for three weeks following his arrest last October 16. After he was conditionally freed pending trial, his lawyer said the FPI would halt its attacks on nightspots.

Art & popular culture

Pornography or performance?

Radio Australia - April 22, 2003

Indonesian music sensation Inul Daratista is getting complaints from muslim clerics. She may be one of the country's most popular artists but the clerics say her gyrating dance movements and skimpy costumes are indecent and immoral.

Transcript:

Barraud: It's described as a kind of salsa, but the mixture of traditional Javanese, Indian, Portuguese, Arabic and Malay music is uniquely Indonesian. Dangdut music reflects the tropical heat, the acrid smells of polluted streets, dark coffee bars and clove cigarettes. Wait at a city taxi stand or ride in a bus in the countryside and you'll hear its beat through the tinny headphones of a worker or farmer. But the dangdut singer sensation Inul Daratista's version -- apparently conjures other -- more basic images.

Azra: "In my observation I think the dancing is fairly sensual, something like you see it in striptease dancing, bringing your imagination into sexual relations between male and female so we call it "drilling" meaning you know like a woman and a man drilling each other in sexual intercourse."

Barraud: Dr Azumardi Azra is President of the State Islamic University in Jakarta. He reflects the view of many Muslim clerics. While Dr Azumardi doesn't really object to the music or even her scanty costumes, he believes Inul's gyrating dance style borders on the pornographic. He says while it might be acceptable in small karaoke bars and discos, it's too hot for television and large public concerts.

Azra: "Probably also we can call it dirty dancing or something like that, but this touched public decency and people began to question it beause she performs that kind of dance in public."

Barraud: The main Islamic group, the Indonesian Ulemas Council has strongly objected to Inul's dancing style. Religious leaders in the conservative East Java region have banned her performing although the ban is not enforceable.

24 year old Inul Daratista was a rock singer in the small village of Gempol in East Java, when a besotted amateur cameraman sent copies he'd made of her performances to friends overseas. Within months she'd dropped western style rock and switched to the Indonesian dangdut, which she accompanies with frenetic and sensual dance movements.

Her concerts, held in soccer stadiums and large auditoriums are booked out and her television appearances have boosted ratings and advertising revenue, making her one of the most courted local performers in Indonesian history. She is yet to record an album, but an estimated 3 million people have bought pirate video CDs. One fan who managed to get hold of a VCD is Dr Ariel Haryanto who teaches Indonesian popular culture at Melbourne University

Haryanto: "I'm going to show her dance in a recording for my students in the next few days, few weeks actually. To be very honest I'm a great fan of Inul, I think Inul is so original and authentic, not trying to be clever or trying to be more erotic than she needs to, a lot of other performances are much more vulgar in terms of eroticism. Not Inul, definitely. I have a collection of dances of dangdut and she's definitely one of the most civilised. If you look at the others they are much more vulgar."

Barraud: Dr Haryanto says from the early 1930's dangdut was an expression of the rural and lower classes. While sometimes bawdy and accompanied by often sexually suggestive dancing it also had a strong religious element. During the Suharto regime it was considered the music of dissent.

Haryanto: "The military regime put a lot of Islam leaders into prison and under repression and therefore when dangdut was attached to Islam it became like a symbol of resistance. Now things have changed, definitely, Islam has been politically correct in Indonesia and the radical edge of dangdut shifted again from being religious expression into something else."

Barraud: Inul has stated she's taking dangdut music and performance back to those earlier earthier roots. Dr Haryanto believes it's this authenticity which has helped Inul's meteoric rise to fame -- and contributed to the controversy over whether her dancing is pornographic.

Haryanto: "Decency that's of course true to some segments of the society I think, not just have to do with any particaulor religion, but also with class. Inul is definitely from the lower class and as Inul herself describes there's a lot of pornographic CDs around and people have not done anything about it they just leave it alone. But none -- as I said earlier -- as powerfully famous and threatening as Inul, I think that's the real reason."

Barraud: President of the State Islamic University Dr Azumardi Azra agrees Inul's dance style reflects the lower classes and believes it's not appropriate for a wide audience, although he disagrees with some clerics who have suggested a moral edict or fatwa be issued on Inul.

Azra: "Educated young generation I think do not watch her show but most of her fans are people of the lower level of society."

Barraud: She's really low culture you think?

Azra: "Yes. Of course I don't think we should issue a fatwa or relgious ruling in connection with this."

Baraud: Why not?

Azra: "I think it's not useful."

Barraud: It would probably make her become more popular wouldn't it?

Azra: "Yes I think that's right. It's not going to work so I think the best way is probably to have a dialogue with her -- that's the best way."

Haryanto: "Mind you even among the Islamic community there's been a great deal of division and even a public one at that. So there's been a threat for example of arson in one case, where a Muslim religious leader painted Inul surrounded by Muslim clerics during the prayer -- then there was a threat mosque that would bve burned because of that display of painting by a quite a respected cleric for example."

Barraud: She's been photographed with the husband of Megawati, and I understand the military commander of the police in Jakarta and I think the Mayor have performed on stage with her.

Haryanto: "I'm not surprised, yes. She has been very popular definitely and I think what makes some nervous is that she's popular among the masses. Now that really worries some."

Barraud: Dr Haryanto says in some ways the controversy over Inul is to be admired because it reflects the diversity of Indonesia including its Muslim leaders. Meanwhile whether clerics, politicians and leaders court or criticise, Inul Daratista continues to draw tens of thousands of fans.

Armed forces/police

'Police losing dignity and getting less respect'

Jakarta Post - April 26, 2003

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, Jakarta -- The police are losing their authority and many people do not respect them -- as was evident in the escape of Islam Defenders Front (FPI) chairman Habib Rizieq Shihab, as well as in the attack on Tempo magazine's office and its journalists, a lawyer said.

Hendardi, coordinator of the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Foundation (PBHI), made the statement during an interview with The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.

Police received a slap in the face when FPI supporters snatched their chief, who was arrested for alleged vandalism, from underneath the noses of armed policemen in front of the prosecutor's office on Monday.

The case was similar to last month's attack on Tempo's office and its journalists by supporters of businessman Tomy Winata, which happened in the presence of police officers.

The police shifted the blame for Rizieq's escape by pointing their fingers at prosecutors, who had just received the case file from police earlier in the day. However, this only raised further criticism regarding the police force's authority. "By not exercising its duty and authority, the police force is losing its dignity," Hendardi said.

The police were under fire for both Rizieq's escape and the attack on Tempo, because they were present during both incidents, but did nothing to prevent them.

Hendardi suspected that the police often took political interests into account when exercising their authority. "Now, it has backfired, since the FPI members and thugs no longer respect the police," he said.

In Rizieq's case, he said, the police could not blame anyone but themselves, because the law had entrusted them with the power to anticipate any eventualities during the transferal of a suspect. Police should have had a contingency plan, especially given the large number of FPI supporters present.

Head of Jakarta Prosecutor's Office Muljohardjo deplored the police's stance on the incident, saying that there should be a continued cooperation between investigators and prosecutors in arranging security for the case.

On Monday, hundreds of FPI supporters "rescued" Rizieq from police as he was being transferred to the Jakarta Prosecutor's Office on Jl. HR Rasuna Said in South Jakarta. He was then taken away on a city bus, which had been hijacked as it was passing the office.

Later on the same day, the supporters returned Rizieq to prosecutors, and wrote a letter to the Attorney General on the next day to apologize for the "kidnapping". City police spokesman Sr. Comr. Prasetyo said they would investigate the incident.

The incident occurred hours after the Muslim cleric was arrested by city police on Sunday evening at Soekarno-Hatta Airport, as he was returning from Jordan on a humanitarian mission -- as he claimed.

Rizieq was declared a fugitive after he ignored two summonses to report to police after his case file had been completed He is charged with encouraging FPI members to vandalize a number of entertainment centers over the last three years, and for spreading hatred against the government. The charges carry a maximum punishment of seven years in jail.

On Thursday, the Jakarta Prosecutor's Office submitted his case file to the Central Jakarta Prosecutor's Office who would later represent the case at the Central Jakarta District Court.

Indonesia to re-equip air force

Associated Press - April 24, 2003

Slobodan Lekic, Jakarta -- Frustrated by Washington's long running embargo over arms sales because of human rights concerns, Indonesia plans to buy dozens of high-performance fighter bombers from Russia over the next several years.

The state Antara news agency reported Thursday that the deal was struck during a visit to Russia by President Megawati Sukarnoputri. On Wednesday, she toured a testing ground for Sukhoi fighter jets in Zhukovsky outside Moscow and watched the performance of a Su-27 fighter jet.

The two governments have agreed to improve overall trade ties. However, the focus of Megawati's visit appears to have been procuring Russian jets, helicopters and armored vehicles to modernize Indonesia's obsolescent armed forces.

Indonesia had looked to the United States for its military needs since the 1960s after then-dictator Gen. Suharto seized power from Sukarno, the country's founding president and Megawati's father. Annual arms purchases peaked at $400 million in the 1980s.

In 1991, however, the US Congress banned exports after Indonesian troops killed hundreds of civilians in East Timor. In 1999, East Timor seceded, but only after Indonesian forces and pro- Indonesian militias laid waste to the territory as the military withdrew after a pro-independence referendum. The destruction prompted US lawmakers to extend the ban to cover almost all military ties with Jakarta.

Since then, some members of the Bush administration -- particularly Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, a former ambassador to Jakarta -- have pushed for the ban to be repealed. They argue that Jakarta's generals should be engaged not shunned despite their human rights abuses.

The embargo and resulting lack of spare parts has had a devastating effect on the serviceability of all US weapons systems in the Indonesian inventory. But the air force has been particularly severely hit. Only half of its 10 F-16 Falcons and 24 F-5E Tiger fighters are considered airworthy, while an entire 12-plane attack squadron of Skyhawk jets had to be grounded.

Speaking in Moscow, Indonesia's military chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto said the country would purchase an initial batch of two long-range Su-27 and two Su-30 jets to be delivered this year. At least 44 other planes will be delivered over the next four years, Sutarto said. "We have decided to buy these jet fighters and ideally we need four squadrons of 12 planes each," he said as quoted by Antara.

The Sukhois will likely replace all US-made jets in the Indonesian inventory, except for the F-16s which may soldier on as fighter-bombers. Their 1,800-mile range will allow them to patrol the vast Indonesian archipelago better than the short- range US jets.

Jakarta military wants 48 Russian aircraft

Straits Times - April 24, 2003

Moscow -- Indonesia's armed forces commander, General Endriartono Sutarto, has disclosed that the Indonesian air force wants to have 48 Russian-made Sukhoi fighter planes to enable it to secure the country and maintain its sovereignty.

"Ideally, we should have four squadrons or 48 Sukhoi fighter planes and we hope to achieve the number in the next four years," he told newsmen here on Tuesday night. He said the air force has for the moment decided to buy two Sukhoi-27s, two Sukhoi-30s and two MI-35 helicopters for a total value of US$197 million.

Of the amount, he noted, some 12.5 per cent will be paid in cash, and the rest will be paid through a countertrade scheme. Indonesia's state Bank Bukopin has been tasked to lend the government US$21 million as bailout funds to cover the cash payment, he said.

Asked about the possible negative reaction of Western countries and the US over Indonesia's purchase of Russian fighter planes, he said this was understandable.

The US imposed a military embargo on Indonesia in 1999 due to the latter's alleged support for militia violence in then East Timor.

Meanwhile, the chief of the Indonesian military's Operational Command II, Rear Marshal Teddy Sumarno, who accompanied Gen Endriartono to Russia, expressed hope that the fighter planes would arrive in Jakarta by September at the latest. A number of pilots and technical officers will be sent to Russia in June to study the operation of the airplanes, he said.

Industry and Trade Minister Rini Soewandi confirmed that the negotiations for the purchase of the fighter planes began during her visit to Russia in September last year. She had then offered 31 commodities for the countertrade scheme.

Russia has agreed to buy several commodities from Indonesia, among them rubber, palm oil, tea, coffee, cocoa, textile and bauxite, she said.

She pointed out that the countertrade agreement was supposed to be signed on Tuesday night here, but the signing was moved to yesterday instead as it had to be checked by lawyers first.

The Indonesian government has tasked the State Logistics Agency (Bulog) to sign the trade contract, while Russia will be represented by one of its state companies.

Ms Rini also said that Bank Bukopin has been chosen to provide the loan for the cash payment as it has completed the government's recapitalisation programme.

Meanwhile, Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry secretary- general Djoko Darmono said that Indonesia might buy a floating nuclear power plant from Russia as part of its efforts to prevent electricity shortage in the next decade.

Russia, which approved construction of the world's first floating nuclear power plant in October, offered to sell a ship-based reactor to President Megawati Sukarnoputri during her visit to Moscow earlier this week.

Can Mega pay for arms purchases?

Straits Times - April 21, 2003

Devi Asmarani, Jakarta -- President Megawati Sukarnoputri is eyeing Romanian tanks and other military hardware to beef up Indonesia's military strength, yet few know how she plans to pay for the purchases.

As she continues with her trip to Romania, Russia and Poland, reports have said that Jakarta will sign a memorandum of understanding with Moscow for four Sukhoi interceptor jets worth US$120 million.

She will also be shopping for fighter jets, helicopters and tanks during her visit to Poland -- a bid to mitigate the consequences of the military embargo imposed on her country by the United States.

After talks on possible arms cooperation with Romanian President Ion Iliescu, Ms Megawati left Romania yesterday for Russia, where she is scheduled to meet President Vladimir Putin. After visiting Russia, she will go to Poland.

Military analysts believe that Ms Megawati could offer counter- trade deals -- which could be difficult to negotiate -- or simply pay from the Budget and take from the emergency funds for other military needs. But given the ill health of Indonesia's Budget, questions are being raised about the purchases, given other pressing military needs. Some parliamentarians are also complaining that they have not been consulted on the matter.

Counter-trade deals had been used in the past by former president Suharto. He entered into such a deal with Russia, exchanging commodities such as palm oil, toys and stationery for fighter jets and helicopters. The deal, however, fell apart as the economic crisis worsened.

Last year, during a trip to the Balkans, Ms Megawati offered palm oil and natural rubber to Croatian President Stjepan Mesic in exchange for arms.

No details are available as to what she would offer for her current purchases, but analysts doubt if her counter-trade offer would receive much enthusiasm, for the east European countries are also in need of cash.

The other option would be to use funds earmarked for defence expenses -- a kitty of 13.9 trillion rupiah. Military analyst Rizal Sukma told The Straits times: "The government has no other choice but to fund the weapons purchase with the military Budget. What it will likely do to cover the shortage of fund is finance the military operation and troop deployments with off-Budget funds."

He was referring to the money set aside by government offices and state-owned companies for emergency funds. "The prices offered by these countries are much lower, and Indonesia desperately needs to replace its military hardware, which is outrageously and dangerously out of date," he said.

While no one is denying that, parliamentarians -- among them Mr Ibrahim Ambong, who heads the commission which deals with military purchases -- and even officials are wondering why they had not been consulted. The director-general of Budget in the Finance Ministry, Mr Anshari Ritonga, has said he was not aware where the money to pay for the purchases would come from.

With hundreds of thousands of troops deployed in troubled areas, and with the likelihood of a military operation in the separatist province of Aceh, there is mounting concern about how the military would meet all its growing needs.

International relations

Mega signs pact with Russia amid strained US ties

Straits Times - April 22, 2003

Moscow -- Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri and her Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin signed a friendship treaty yesterday, as Jakarta seeks to revive a Soviet-era relationship in the face of growing distance with Washington.

Simultaneously, their ministers penned agreements on weapons sales and cooperation in space intended to help the two countries restore one-time close political and economic ties.

"I am convinced that the Declaration on the Foundations of Friendship and Partnership Relations Between Russia and Indonesia in the 21st Century will give an important impulse to the two countries' cooperation," Mr Putin said.

"Our countries have a rich experience in mutually beneficial cooperation. The situation in Indonesia, including the state of the economy, has improved recently -- that gives grounds for developing our relations in different areas," Mr Putin said. He also said he had accepted an invitation to visit Jakarta.

The two leaders signed the declaration after a one-on-one meeting and a larger meeting attended by numerous Cabinet officials and Indonesian business representatives looking for ways to boost the two countries' lagging trade ties. Trade turnover between the two huge nations came to just US$192 million last year.

Slapped with a US arms embargo 12 years ago and wide differences over the war in Iraq, Indonesia has been turning back to Russia, aiming to rebuild the close ties forged by Ms Megawati's father Sukarno in the 1950s.

Ms Megawati's five-day visit to Moscow -- the first by an Indonesian leader since dictator Suharto visited in 1989 -- is due to focus on major arms deals, including the purchase of Russian aircraft.

Indonesia has already signed a preliminary contract with Russia's state-owned Rosoboronexport for four Russian Sukhoi fighter planes -- two SU-27s and two SU-30s -- worth about US$120 million. But the final shopping list could be much longer.

The Indonesian military has expressed interest in buying more Russian-made Kalashnikov rifles, helicopters, armed personnel carriers and Mi-17 cargo jets -- shipments of which were delivered to Indonesia in the past two years, leading business daily Kommersant said.

Economy & investment

Regional renegades threaten Jakarta's cement deal

Asia Times - April 25, 2003

Bill Guerin, Jakarta -- Indonesian State Minister for State Enterprises Laksamana Sukardi plans a spinoff of two renegade state enterprises, PT Semen Padang and PT Semen Tonasa, from their publicly listed parent company PT Semen Gresik.

In 1995, Semen Gresik in East Java purchased regional cement manufacturers in Padang in West Sumatra and Tonasa in South Sulawesi. The rationale was to expand capacity and achieve economies of scale, allowing the newly merged state-owned entity, the Semen Gresik Group, to face challenges from the private sector in the cement industry.

Mexico's Cemex SA de CV, the world's third-largest cement producer, saw the potential to capture a large slice of the Indonesian market in 1998 at a time when no other foreign investors were willing to take the risk of investing in the country.

A deal was struck when Tanri Abeng, Suharto's minister of state- owned enterprises, chose Semen Gresik as the first of 12 companies he intended to privatize. The government owned 65 percent then and the need, as it has been all along with privatization, was to generate cash flow for the threadbare state purse.

Abeng, through what actually proved to be one of Indonesia's rare transparent bidding processes, offered 35 percent of this 65 percent. Local securities firm Makindo, linked to the Suharto family, did a sweetheart deal with Holderbank, a Swiss investor, but lost out in a two-round bidding process to Cemex with its winning bid of US$1.38 a share. Cemex was duly declared the "preferred bidder" and was granted the right to buy 35 percent of the shares from the government and a further 16 percent from the public, which would give it the desired 51 percent majority control.

Things quickly started to go wrong, with the Padang community opposing the deal and demanding that Semen Padang should no longer be part of Semen Gresik and thus controlled by foreigners. This forced the government to renege and invite Cemex back to the negotiating table, where a new deal was carved out, with the government offering to sell only 14 percent. The sweetener was a three-year put-option agreement that would, after all, allow Cemex to become a majority shareholder in Semen Gresik. Cemex, oddly enough, agreed and subsequently bought the government's offered 14 percent for $114 million, which represented a 112 percent premium on the market price of Semen Gresik shares.

A year later, in 1999, the company bought another 11-plus percent through the market to raise its stake to 25.53 percent, where it remains stuck to this day in spite of the long-expired put-option agreement.

Under this agreement, confirmed by government regulation No 76/1998 in October 1998, Cemex was given the right to buy the government's remaining 51 percent stake but at approved prices. The government had the right to sell out to Cemex and Cemex was obliged to buy the stock at the agreed price of US$1.72 per share or for a total of $520 million, which value equated to almost three times the Semen Gresik price quotation on the Jakarta Stock Exchange at the time.

The put option, however, guaranteed a price of US$1.38 per share for the government's remaining shares.

Semen Padang management, backed up by the provincial executive and legislature, was even angrier over the put option. Leaders of the provincial legislature (DPRD) in Padang, a staunch Islamic community, the governor of West Sumatra and top management in Semen Padang took the law into their own hands.

Power in the public sector and in the bureaucracy moved sharply from central to local government with the hasty introduction of the regional-autonomy law in 2001. The explosive mix of the state's privatization program with this decentralization took a heavy toll and the West Sumatra province of Padang was the testing ground for the inevitable battle of wills between Jakarta and local government.

In November 2001 the DPRD passed a decree expropriating Semen Padang until it was separated from Semen Gresik and no longer part of any deal with Cemex. The declaration, signed by the Indonesian Council of Ulemas (MUI) and the Association of Indonesian Muslim Intellectuals (ICMI), gained unanimous support from the 13 factions present, including the PDI-P faction.

This was not only against the constitution, as Sukardi lamely pointed out, but showed that President Megawati Sukarnoputri, who heads the party with the largest number of seats in Parliament, PDI-P, was unable to rally political support from her own party. Sukardi himself is a senior figure in the party and a close aide to the president.

Similarly, in faraway South Sulawesi, local interests were able to block the planned selloff of Semen Tonasa. In the end, the 2001 privatization target of Rp6.5 trillion (about US$628 million) was not achieved, principally because of the loss of a cash injection of $528.8 million (Rp5.4 trillion), which represented more than 80 percent of the privatization target.

In the final year of the deadline, Sukardi next unveiled a plan, fundamentally different from the put option under the 1998 agreement, by which the government would sell its remaining 51 percent stake in Semen Gresik and use the proceeds to buy back a majority stake in Semen Padang and Semen Tonasa, leaving the two under national control. Cemex would still own 76 percent of Semen Gresik and a minority stake in Semen Padang and Tonasa.

This variation-on-a-theme put-option agreement valued Semen Gresik's shares at $1.65 apiece, compared with the shares' market value at the time of Rp4,500 (about 45 US cents), which meant Cemex would have ended up paying four times what the value of Semen Gresik was then.

West Sumatra leaders, legislators and community leaders called the new plan an insult to the province's pride, repeating demands that Semen Padang be spun off from Semen Gresik entirely. The response from Cemex Indonesia president Francisco Noriega was to insist that his company would not buy Semen Gresik's shares at the agreed price without its two units, PT Semen Padang and PT Semen Tonasa, being included.

The Semen Gresik under the put option referred to three cement units with a combined capacity of 17.25 million tons, while Sukardi's proposal offered only the Gresik unit with 8.2 million ton capacity as the Tonasa unit with 3.48 million tons and the Padang unit with a 5.57 million ton capacity would become government-controlled stand-alone companies.

Noriega summed it up, "If you separate the companies, there is no put option because you bought the three companies together."

Gresik was trading this week at about Rp7,750 (89 cents), making any such deal scarcely more plausible.

If realized, the deal would have earned the government $525 million while acting as a catalyst for the return of badly need foreign investors, but letting the deal expire, even after Cemex had agreed to extend it by three months, indicates that the government was already throwing in the towel. Jakarta's stance appears to be that it would still honor part of its commitment to Cemex by allowing it to increase its shareholding in Semen Gresik to 76.50 percent. Not only does this raise serious doubt about the government's ability to honor its contract but highlights its inability to overcome the difficulties thrown up by the process of selling state-owned assets to the private sector, especially where foreign strategic investors are involved.

Though Sukardi has said his new variation on a theme is conditional on the spinoff not "violating the law", most political analysts see the proposal as proof that three years of resistance and manipulation by politicians and corrupt officials has finally forced Jakarta to acquiesce to pressure from provincial legislators.

The long-running saga of Semen Gresik's progress toward still- elusive privatization also highlights the entrenched power of those who treat Semen Gresik and its subsidiaries as their cash cows. This bodes ill for any prospects of resolution of this debacle in the run-up to the 2004 elections. Valuable assets that could contribute substantially to local development through employment, taxes and other benefits remain in limbo.

Vested interests in the provinces will be able to stoke up similar regional sentiment to take control of state enterprises. Spurious claims of fighting for the interests of local people belie the reality that employees were allowed to revolt against the decisions of the owners of the companies that employed them.

The cement industry is in decline, at least recently. Domestic cement sales are a key economic indicator and last month Semen Gresik said its own February sales, including exports, fell 16.3 percent year-on-year to 809,081 tons as local and export sales declined.

Its domestic sales last month dipped 1.2 percent year-on-year to 735,195 tons and exports plunged 66.7 percent to 73,886 tons in the same period.

The Mexicans could be forgiven for seeking redress in the courts for breach of contract by a government that, at least in this case, has singularly failed to maintain its authority, although it may still hold the trump card, based on the law.

The shareholder structure remains unchanged after three years of strife and shame -- the government holding 51 percent, the public with 23.46 percent and Cemex with 25.53 percent. Sukardi's new plan, which he claims is the "best option", may not fly anyway, as it has yet to receive Cemex's consent and will need to be approved by Semen Gresik's independent shareholders, the investing public, as well as Cemex itself.

The Law on Limited Liability Companies and other regulations mean that any such spinoff or drastic change to the structure of a publicly listed company can only be approved by minority shareholders.

Economic stability not bringing higher growth: World Bank

Jakarta Post - April 25, 2003

Jakarta -- Indonesia's increasing economic stability is not translating into higher growth, the World Bank said on Thursday.

The bank, in its East Asian outlook as quoted by AFP, forecast gross domestic product growth of 3.3 percent this year, lower than the government's projection, and 4.0 percent in 2004.

The economy had shown "remarkable resilience" to last October's Bali terror bombings. Increased political stability and economic reforms under the current government had been beneficial for macroeconomic stability, with inflation and interest rates falling and the rupiah strengthening.

"However, there are few signs that macroeconomic stability and reduced vulnerability [to shocks such as Bali] is translating into higher growth." The government's forecast for 2003 growth is for 4.0 percent. It has not made a forecast for 2004. The economy grew 3.66 percent last year.

Finance minister optimistic of achieving 4% growth

Jakarta Post - April 25, 2003

Jakarta -- Minister of Finance Boediono expressed optimism on Thursday that the economy will grow by 4 percent this year, despite a downturn in the global economy.

"We are continuing to project it at 4 percent. We are optimistic about it because our exports remain strong," Boediono said as quoted by Antara here on Thursday.

He was responding to a World Bank forecast presented by its vice president, Jemal-ud-din, at a teleconference with journalists earlier in the day.

In its forecast, the World Bank has revised downward East Asia's growth rate to 5 percent, from 6 percent, due to the US-led war in Iraq and the outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). The World Bank also maintained its previous forecast that the Indonesian economy would grow by 3.3 percent this year, despite the Iraq war and SARS.

Boediono said Indonesia's exports were able to withstand the global economic slowdown because they were diversified, and some of the commodities were highly priced at present. "I am optimistic that if we work hard, we can achieve 4 percent growth," he said.

Rupiah defies Indonesia's gravity

Asia Times - April 24, 2003

Gary LaMoshi, Denpasar -- One of the world's great mysteries, right up there with how Jiang Zemin's hair stayed black for all those years, is that amazing strength of the Indonesian rupiah on foreign-currency markets, defying the gravity of Indonesia's economic situation. As someone who earns other currencies but often spends rupiah, I pay close attention to these market fluctuations. If I can't profit from them, at least I try to understand them, though I find either goal elusive.

Since Indonesian legislators drove president Abdurrahman Wahid from office in July 2001, the rupiah's US dollar exchange rate has strengthened by more than 20 percent from 11,000 to the 8,670 it touched on Monday, a one-year high. That rise mirrors the drop in the value of the US dollar against the euro in recent months, but the resemblance doesn't explain the phenomenon.

Other Southeast Asian currencies haven't appreciated the way the rupiah has in the wake of the greenback's weakness. Those currencies remain in their established post-financial-crisis trading zones, while the rupiah is still far stronger than its usual benchmark of 10,000.

Before the regional economic collapse of 1997, 2-5 was the rough reference point for US dollar exchange rates in Southeast Asia: 2.5 Malaysian ringgit to the dollar, 25 Thai baht, 25 Philippine pesos, 2,500 rupiah. The crisis changed multiple for the first three currencies to 4-0 (Malaysia lowered its number with currency controls, and the Philippines pushed its above 50 when it ousted president Joseph Estrada for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo), so you needed 1.6 times as many local units to buy the same number of dollars. By contrast, the rupiah went to 10,000, meaning you needed four times as many for the same number of dollars. From that perspective, the rupiah has merely been closing a wide value gap with the currencies of its neighbors that, at least in the case of Philippines, don't stand that far above Indonesia on the political economy hit parade.

Over the past two years, one of the best investments on the planet would have been converting your dollars to rupiah and putting them in the bank in Jakarta. You would have earned about 13 percent on the bank deposit, plus the 21 percent currency appreciation. Of course, that investment requires faith -- not just faith in the rupiah but faith in an Indonesian bank, and that gets to the fundamental reason I find the stronger rupiah tough to understand.

Like stock prices for companies, currency rates roughly equate to a market judgment of the issuing country. I have a tough time seeing that things have been more than 20 percent better for Indonesia than for the United States over the past 22 months. Each nation is saddled with an addle-brained second-generation president with a shaky mandate fronting for the nation's basest entrenched interests. Each country was the target of a devastating terrorist attack and has a huge budget deficit, dwindling tax collection, and sluggish business climate. Of course, as the world's largest economy, the US has a far stronger base than Indonesia without major risks -- collapse, coup, chaos -- that Indonesia faces.

Which brings me back to the question, why is the rupiah up more than 20 percent against the dollar? At a loss intellectually and financially, I asked an expert, Deborah Pastor, a 20-year veteran of the currency pits, and now the portfolio manager for Privateer Asset Management and director of eRaider.com. "Watch the cash flows," Pastor counseled. "The economy is somewhat regulated by capital flows."

While currency rates depend on the strength of the economy, they're also subject to the laws of supply and demand. The rupiah's dramatic drop relative to neighboring currencies in 1997 indicates that people sold "everything and the kitchen sink", Pastor explained. "The bad news was already out there, and there were a lot of short positions in place." In other words, there weren't many rupiah left to sell after that, so the currency price couldn't sink much further.

By the same token, once there was a reason to buy rupiah, the price was bound to rise. "With privatizations and bonds sales, there are rupiah assets to buy again and now people want some rupiah. They haven't been holding any, so they have to go into the market to get it, and that pushes the value up," according to Pastor. "In cases like this one, it's just a question of cash flow, not an endorsement of the economy as a whole."

That's sensible as far as it goes. But a currency also needs a strong underlying economy and a stable civil system to support whatever value the market assigns. Neither is on tap in Indonesia.

As the rupiah soared on Monday, the courts stooped, handing seven Kopassus special forces troops sentences ranging from 24-42 months for the murder of Theys Hiyo Eluay, a non-violent advocate of Papuan independence. The trial failed to establish who gave the order for the November 2001 killing, and three of the convicted murderers were not even discharged from the army. Under normal circumstances, the courts mete out justice to the highest bidder.

One of the current hot debates in Jakarta is whether Indonesia should pull out of its International Monetary Fund agreement when it expires late this year. Advocates on both sides of the debate agree that the IMF program has brought neither reform nor recovery to Indonesia. Well, there's a good reason for a stronger currency.

The privatization program that's boosting demand for rupiah remains a mess. The government has failed to explain privatization as anything more than a device to fund the budget urged by the IMF. While tycoons maneuver to get back their assets the government kindly bailed out of bankruptcy (see The Lippo Bank saga, March 23), legitimate privatization sales to overseas investors get bogged down in political wrangling and nationalist rhetoric.

Corruption is one of Indonesia's few growth industries, as weakened central authority expands opportunities for graft at all levels. National elections due next year will produce further sleaze (such as the re-election, if not the presidential candidacy, of convicted felon and House Speaker Akbar Tanjung) and add further political paralysis to a process that's already near gridlock.

Fortunately, the legislative standstill won't derail implementation of an effective economic recovery program; President Megawati Sukarnoputri's government hasn't got one. There's no plan for getting the estimated 40 million unemployed back to work, or lifting 100 million citizens above the poverty line. Export industries suffer with the stronger rupiah, while the government cites the rising currency as one of its key achievements.

To this observer, the rupiah's 20 percent rise against the dollar seems insane. If you play the currency markets, it seems rational that the rupiah will fall rather than rise against the dollar, if only to correct this overshoot from its previously established level. Of course, an aphorism widely misattributed to John Maynard Keynes warns, "Markets can remain irrational much longer than you can remain solvent."