Aceh

US urges Jakarta to accept outside monitors

Financial Times - May 30, 2003

James Politi, Washington -- The US on Friday raised the political pressure on Indonesia, urging the Pacific nation to allow independent monitors into Aceh, the restive island province where Jakarta recently launched a massive military crackdown on separatists.

Paul Wolfowitz, deputy defence secretary and US ambassador to Indonesia during the Reagan administration, said it would be "very helpful" if Jakarta allowed independent observers into Aceh. "I think it can help encourage the world that Indonesia is behaving, its troops are behaving professionally and carefully," said Mr Wolfowitz, speaking in Singapore after meeting Indonesia's defence minister, Matori Abdul Djalil.

This week Jakarta said it wanted all foreign aid workers to leave Aceh and all future aid to be distributed through government agencies, raising fears that the government hopes to limit international scrutiny of its campaign.

Earlier this month Indonesia abandoned last-ditch talks in Tokyo aimed at preserving a five-month ceasefire with separatists fighting under the banner of the Free Aceh Movement (Gam).

The collapse of the talks led Megawati Sukarnoputri, Indonesia's president, to declare martial law in Aceh and to instruct about 40,000 troops and police to crack down on Gam in the nation's largest military deployment since the 1975 invasion of East Timor.

"This is not the way we were hoping things would turn out," said one US State Department official, who added that the US was watching the situation "carefully".

Mr Djalil said the Aceh operation was both military and humanitarian, and that he was hopeful of Indonesia's success within six months. "And maybe it will finish in just two or three months because we understand, and we are aware, that too long [a period of] martial law, I think, is not good for our government," he said.

One way the US could reprimand the Indonesian military for bad behaviour would be to withhold funding for military training under the Indonesian portion of the international military education and training (IMET) programme, worth $400,000.

Last week the US Senate's foreign relations committee passed an amendment linking IMET funding to co-operation with the US government, but Mr Wolfowitz was sceptical.

Separately, the deputy defence secretary denied a report in the Los Angeles Times that suggested the US was planning to redeploy marines stationed in Okinawa, Japan, to other countries on the Pacific rim.

"That's simply not right," Mr Wolfowitz said, while acknowledging that the US was "taking a fundamental look" at its defence posture worldwide, including Asia. "But no decisions have been made about any of those changes yet."

Anger rises in Indonesia over Sweden's inaction

Agence France Presse - June 1, 2003

Anger was rising in Indonesia against Sweden over the Scandanavian country's refusal to act on Jakarta's demand that it stop one of its citizens from leading an Aceh separatist group.

The Indonesian government last month called on Stockholm to act against Hasan Tiro, who helped found the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) in 1976 and has since become a Swedish citizen. "In diplomatic terms, Sweden has taken a hostile position against us," said Amien Rais, chairman of the People's Consultative Assembly.

He told ElShinta radio Sunday that the Swedish government should hand Tiro over to Indonesia. "We will also not act foolishly. There are legal procedures and codes of ethics," he said.

However, he also said he supported severing ties with Sweden over Stockholm's rejection to act against Tiro. "I think is a very wise and firm decision," he said.

Lesser moves, including downgrading ties or pulling out envoys, would only signal Jakarta's half-heartedness over the matter, he added. However, he said Stockholm should be a week's deadline to act.

"What is Sweden? Trade ties only cover several million dollars only and will not hurt us at all, and the role of Sweden in the West, in Europe, is only peripheral, marginal," Rais said.

Annual bilateral trade in 2002 stood at around 350 million dollars but Swedish-made Volvo sedans are the official vehicles of Indonesian ministers. Swedish officials have said that Sweden does not support the GAM, an organisation it said held no official status in Sweden. But they added they could not take action against a citizen who did not break the law in Sweden.

Rais' comments are in line with those of many politicians. "If our diplomatic efforts are not taken seriously by the Swedish government, then Indonesia can take other diplomatic steps, such as the proposal to sever diplomatic ties with Sweden," House Speaker Akbar Tanjung said in Padang, West Sumatra on Friday.

Downgrading diplomatic ties or severing the relations with Sweden were "the right moves to show that Indonesia is serious in taking firm actions against those in Sweden who are seeking to separate Aceh from indonesia," Tanjung said.

Taking firm diplomatic actions against Sweden "is the official stance of the DPR," said Legislator Ibrahim Ambong referring to the People's Representative Council (DPR), according to the Jakarta Post daily.

A poll carried by the Detikcom online news service Sunday showed that of 3,028 votes, 81 percent agreed that Jakarta should cut diplomatic ties with Stockholm to show the nation's displeasure.

Jakarta on May 19 put Aceh under martial law and has launched a massive military operation to rid the resource rich province at the northernmost tip of Sumatra island of the GAM. The move followed the failure of a peace process initiated in 2000.

US steers Indonesia away from war against separatists

New York Times - May 31, 2003

Jane Perlez, Singapore -- Paul D. Wolfowitz, the United States deputy secretary of defense, warned the Indonesian Army today that its war against separatist rebels in the northern province of Aceh could not be won militarily.

In a second rebuke to Indonesia, Mr. Wolfowitz, who was the American ambassador to the country in the late 1980's, said the Indonesian government had to be more forthcoming with the United States over who was responsible for the killing of two Americans during an armed attack in the eastern province of Irian Jaya last year.

The Indonesian military began a large-scale offensive against separatist guerrillas in Aceh nearly two weeks ago, after peace talks collapsed. The government said it would no longer tolerate the demands for independence by the rebels, who have resisted successive army campaigns against them for nearly 30 years.

Mr. Wolfowitz, who is considered one of the staunchest supporters of the Indonesian military in the Bush administration, offered the criticisms after meeting here with the Indonesian defense secretary, Matori Abdul Djalil. The two men were attending a conference on defense issues in Asia organized by the London- based International Institute for Strategic Studies. Mr. Matori stood beside Mr. Wolfowitz as he delivered the admonishments at a news conference.

The Bush administration has been trying to find ways to restore financial aid to the Indonesian military, which lost American aid in the 1990's because of human rights abuses by the army in East Timor. In the past year, the Pentagon has offered the Indonesian army training in counterterrorism and won congressional approval to restart a prestigious, though limited, program of training in the United States for Indonesian officers.

But Mr. Wolfowitz suggested today that these new measures might be in jeopardy, or at the very least would go no further, if the Indonesian military and its civilian overseers did not do more to meet the administration's expectations.

A number of civilians have been killed already in the current campaign, which the government says will last for six months. The government has warned foreign aid organizations to leave the province.

In one incident last week near the Bireuen regency, south of the capital of Bande Aceh, the military said that 10 people, including a 13-year-old, were killed in a firefight. But eyewitnesses said some of these people were summarily executed, an account that Western military experts in Jakarta said appeared to be correct.

Mr. Wolfowitz said the United States understood the concern that Indonesia had for preserving its territorial integrity. "At the same time we believe very strongly the solution has to be a political one," he said. He urged the Indonesians to accept the offers of nongovernmental organizations to act as monitors in Aceh. "I told the minister that it would be helpful if actions of the armed forces are transparent," he said.

The National Commission on Human Rights said this week that it would press ahead with sending its members to Aceh to observe events there, despite reservations expressed by the government about their plans.

Mr. Wolfowitz took a particularly strong stand on the lack of progress on the investigation into the deaths last August of two American teachers whose vehicles came under fire as they returned from a picnic in Irian Jaya. They were employees of the New Orleans-based mining company Freeport-McMoran Copper and Gold.

A report by the Indonesian police in Irian Jaya, headed at the time by the respected Made Mangku Pastika, concluded there was a "strong possibility" that the Indonesian military was behind the killings. Some American officials agreed with Mr. Pastika's findings at the time.

"The issue of the Freeport killings is a very important issue," Mr. Wolfowitz said. "We have made it clear at the highest level we need satisfactory cooperation from Indonesia or it will affect our whole relationship."

An American official familiar with the proceedings of Mr. Wolfowitz's meeting with the defense minister said the deputy secretary had made it clear that the Bush administration was demanding the civilian and military branches of the Indonesian government to be more forthcoming on the deaths of the Americans.

A team from the Federal Bureau of Investigation has visited Irian Jaya on several occasions but has been frustrated in its efforts to conclude an investigation by lack of cooperation by the Indonesians, a senior American official said.

The deaths of the Americans, Rick Spier of Colorado, and Ted Burgon of Oregon, has taken on a new urgency in the last several weeks as the widow of Mr. Spier, Patsy Spier, has traveled to Washington and lobbied Congress and the Bush administration to make a definitive investigation. Mrs. Spier met with Mr. Wolfowitz earlier this month. She made an impression with her arguments, Pentagon officials said. Members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee also met with her.

Last week, the committee voted unanimously to urge the Bush administration not to go ahead with spending $400,000 that was approved last year for training Indonesian officers in the United States. The approval was interpreted by the Indonesian government as a symbolic victory of a restoration of ties, even though the funding was very low.

The committee said the administration should certify that the Indonesian military was cooperating with the F.B.I. on the Irian Jaya killings before starting the training known as the International Military Education and Training program.

US calls for transparency on Aceh offensive

Reuters - May 30, 2003

David Fogarty, Singapore -- Deputy US Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz called on Indonesia on Friday to ensure transparency in its military offensive in Aceh province and said independent monitoring should be allowed.

Wolfowitz, speaking after meeting Indonesia's defence minister in Singapore on the sidelines of a security conference, also called for a political solution to the struggle by Acehnese rebels for independence of the oil and gas-rich province.

"It would be very helpful if Indonesia would make sure that the actions of its forces are transparent and I think the request of some NGOs [non-governmental organisations] to be able to come into Aceh to monitor the situation are good requests. It will help encourage the world that Indonesia is behaving professionally and carefully," he added.

Indonesia said earlier this week that it had advised foreign aid workers in Aceh to leave because of security concerns.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Tuesday the five international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and four UN agencies operating in Aceh had not been banned from the province but were given little choice but to leave.

Thousands of people have fled their homes and food distribution has been disrupted since the military launched their offensive to crush Free Aceh Movement rebels and bring an end to a 27-year separatist conflict in which thousands have died.

Indonesian Defence Minister Matori Abdul Djalil, speaking to reporters after talks with Wolfowitz, said the military campaign in Aceh would be relatively short. "We hope the military action is not more than six months and maybe it will finish in two to three months. We understand that too long a measure is not good for our government."

His comments reinforced remarks from Indonesian military chief, General Endriartono Sutarto, who said on Wednesday that troops were making fast progress against the rebels and that he planned to speed up the campaign and finish it within two months.

Wolfowitz also said the killing of two American teachers in an ambush at a US-run mine in far eastern Papua province last year could still affect relations between the two nations. "We made it clear at the highest levels in Indonesia we need satisfactory cooperation with Indonesia or it will affect the whole relationship," he said.

More than a dozen gunmen ambushed a convoy near the mine operated by Freeport-McMoRan Copper and Gold Inc last August, killing the teachers and an Indonesian. FBI agents joined an Indonesian team earlier this year to investigate but no one has been charged over the killings and no details of FBI's findings have been made public.

Aceh on view: Iraq war dij' vu

Asia Times - May 31, 2003

Kafil Yamin, Jakarta -- As the Indonesian television journalist faced the cameras from atop a military truck, the sound of gunfire interrupted his report, providing immediacy and reality to his real-time broadcast from Aceh province.

The report by SCTV is exclusive coverage courtesy of the Indonesian military, which has been arranging for media to go with its troops during operations that began on May 19, after the collapse of the peace process between Acehnese separatist rebels and Jakarta.

"We let reporters see what is happening. We want the public [to] know what we are doing here," said Major-General Endang Suwarya, officer in charge of the military emergency in Aceh, where rebels have been fighting the Indonesian state for 26 years now.

SCTV's live report was followed by a press conference by Lieutenant-Colonel Ahmad Yani Basuki, the commander for the restoration of security in Aceh, who briefed reporters about how the military operations were going.

Eighty-seven members of the Free Aceh Movement, known by its Indonesian acronym GAM, were killed, 32 were arrested and 41 surrendered, he rattled off. "The military also guards convoys of truck carrying food and other relief goods for the Acehnese," he said.

This scene, along with the embedding of journalists with military forces going into hostile territory, somehow began to look familiar to Indonesian viewers, who had followed the US-led invasion of Iraq closely in March.

To many, Basuki was acting like US General Tommy Franks, whose briefings at the Central Command in Qatar were broadcast all around the world.

"The military operation, the TV coverage, and TV talk shows on this issue are photocopies of the US-led 'liberation' of Iraq," commented John Hasbi, owner of a traditional-food restaurant here. "I think both the military and the media are imitating the US military and media in handling the Iraqi war," he said. "They might deny it. But the way they are doing this has given me a strong impression of such imitation."

On Wednesday, Indonesian military chief General Endriartono Sutarto said the operation, being carried out by 40,000 military and police forces against some 5,000 GAM rebels, has been a success. "Our original plan was that within two months we would identify their [GAM] locations and reclaim them, however we made it in only two weeks," he said.

Television commentators have also been drawing parallels between the handling of the war on Iraq and Jakarta's offensive on Aceh.

"The TNI [Indonesian military] treated the Aceh problem as a serious threat to national integration, just like the US saw Iraq as a threat to world peace and US national security," said columnist Ariel Heryanto. "The media have treated the Aceh war as exclusive entertainment, just like CNN and BBC treated the Iraqi war."

Likewise, similarities are being drawn between the Indonesian government and the US government's political plans after the conflict. Just as Washington did after the war on Iraq, Jakarta has been hinting at putting generals and high-ranking military officers in top posts in the transitional administration they see for Aceh after the current military campaign.

The military should be in full control during the transition period in order to prevent separatists from disrupting it, Home Minister Hari Sabarno said.

All these signs of the armed forces' high-profile role not just in the military -- but also political -- aspect of the crackdown on Aceh are causing discomfort among Indonesians who say it exposes the primacy of the military's role in politics even after the Suharto era.

The intensification of the conflict in Aceh, which has long resented Jakarta's profiting from its rich natural resources and military abuses during the Suharto years, may well mark a revival of the military's role in politics, some activists fear. Thus far, the armed forces' role in politics has been on a gradual decline since the Suharto dictatorship ended in 1998.

"The military's success in Aceh will help convince the public that the military's role in politics makes sense," said Mahmudal, chairman of the Student Solidarity for the People (SMUR). "Just like the US military campaign in Iraq convinced the military that this [Aceh] operation made sense."

Others, however, say there may be a good side to this imitation -- it could be pushing the military to be more forthcoming about its actions. In truth, compared to past operations, "the military operation by the TNI is now so open, transparent and well managed," said Deden Riswanda, an activist with the Pemuda Panca Marga youth organization.

The Aceh operation was approved by the House of Representatives. Its terms and budget were also made public. Military officials said the operation is expected to last six months, to cost Rp1.23 trillion (US$148 million) and is subject to evaluation every month.

In Jakarta, Endriartono, Coordinating Minister for Security in Political Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and other top officials hold regular meetings with the House and journalists about Aceh.

"Never in the past has the military's work been so transparent," commented Nafik Abdurrahman, a journalist. "The TNI has engaged in operations in Maluku, Papua, Kalimantan and other areas of conflict in this country, but never with this kind of transparency. "The military officials have taken the US military as an example, and it's good," he said. "But they also took bad examples."

For instance, Nafik said, "They restrict NGOs [non-governmental organizations] working on humanitarian aid from having access to the Acehnese caught in the warfare. They even reject aid that does not go through their command centers." There has been little mention by military officials of the more than 20,000 Acehnese civilians displaced in the past few weeks, news reports say.

Finally, Indonesian officials appear to have begun to accuse Sweden of harboring and supporting separatist leaders -- just as US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld issued warnings to Syria and Iran during the war on Iraq, critics say.

Foreign Minister Hasan Wirayuda said that Indonesia will likely review its diplomatic ties with Sweden -- which had previously given political asylum to GAM leader Hassan Tiro and is home to other GAM leaders in exile -- if does not cooperate with Jakarta.

"We might reduce the status of our diplomatic relations with Sweden in the near future. It depends on how they respond to our proposals," he told journalists here on Wednesday.

Journalists attacked by gunmen in Aceh

Laksamana.Net - May 30, 2003

New York, May 29 -- The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is alarmed by a recent series of sniper attacks in which unknown gunmen have targeted journalists in Aceh, a conflict-riven province on the northwestern tip of the Indonesian archipelago. We are also gravely concerned by mounting evidence of a systematic effort by Indonesian security forces in Aceh to restrict reporting on the fighting there.

Indonesia declared martial law in Aceh effective at midnight on Monday, May 19, beginning a massive military offensive to crush the separatist Free Aceh Movement, known by its Indonesian acronym as GAM. The campaign is the country's biggest military operation since it invaded East Timor in 1975.

CPJ has documented a series of alarming incidents in which journalists have been targeted while driving on the main road between the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, and the town of Lhokseumawe. All of these incidents occurred in Teupin Raya Subdistrict, on a stretch of road near the village of Beureunen, about 2 kilometers away from a security post manned by the Mobile Police Brigade (Brimob), a paramilitary unit. None of the journalists was injured.

On May 21, a vehicle carrying journalists from the Indonesian broadcaster TV 7 was ambushed by snipers in Teupin Raya Subdistrict while the crew was traveling from Banda Aceh to Lhokseumawe. Rizal Wahyu, a TV 7 reporter, was in the vehicle at the time, along with TV 7 cameraman Yusrizal (who goes by only one name). The two said there were several bursts of automatic gunfire, with the bullets passing close enough to hear.

On May 24, Wahyu and Yusrizal of TV 7 were again ambushed by unidentified gunmen at the same location in Teupin Raya at around 2 p.m. while they were returning to Banda Aceh from Lhokseumawe. One of the bullets hit the car's left front bumper. A second car traveling close behind carried reporter Delphi Sinambela, who works for the Indonesian channel Trans TV. Both vehicles were clearly marked "PRESS."

On May 25, along the same stretch of road in Teupin Raya, unidentified gunmen fired on two cars carrying six journalists, including Kemal Jufri, a photographer for Time magazine; Andrew Marshall, a Time reporter; and Orlando de Guzman, Southeast Asia correspondent for Public Radio International's "The World" program and a frequent contributor to the BBC. The journalists' vehicles were both clearly marked "PRESS." Journalists said sustained gunfire from at least two rifles followed the cars for at least a minute, and that the bullets were close enough to hear.

On the same day, in a separate incident at the same location, snipers fired at a car carrying journalists from the Indonesian broadcaster Metro TV. Bullets shattered the rear window of the vehicle and also hit the driver-side door.

Also on May 25, a TV 7 crew stopped in Teupin Raya Subdistrict to take photographs of burned-out buses and trucks lying along the road. Unidentified men wearing camouflage uniforms sped toward them on motorcycles and began firing at them with rifles.

On May 27, a vehicle carrying Associated Press photographer Achmad Ibrahim was ambushed at the same location.

Security forces restrict the media

Military officials in Indonesia's capital, Jakarta, have pledged to avoid civilian casualties and the use of excessive force in Aceh. The government has even taken the unprecedented step of "embedding" about 50 Indonesian journalists with the troops- taking a cue from the press policy adopted by the US military in Iraq.

However, from the first days of the campaign, the head of the martial law administration in Aceh made it clear that he would not tolerate independent reporting on the conflict. Maj. Gen. Endang Suwarya, the military commander in Aceh, warned journalists not to report any statements issued by GAM leaders and said, "I want all news published to contain the spirit of nationalism," according to the national English-language daily Jakarta Post. "Put the interests of the unitary state of Indonesia first." Suwarya added that he will soon issue rules governing press coverage, and that all journalists will have to be accredited by the military command in Aceh.

During the last two weeks, security forces in Aceh have detained, interrogated, and threatened local journalists and foreign correspondents who have reported on abuses committed by soldiers and police in the course of the joint military operation. In addition, several reporters told CPJ that security forces have also detained and harassed their sources. In most cases, journalists did not want to reveal their identities for fear of further reprisals against them and their sources. In particular, journalists who investigated reports that the military executed 10 unarmed villagers in Peusangan Subdistrict, in Bireun, have come under intense pressure by military authorities in Aceh.

Combatants masquerading as journalists?

CPJ is also disturbed by reports from several journalists that armed men have been seen traveling on the main road between Banda Aceh and Lhokseumawe in vehicles marked "PRESS." In at least two cases, journalists said the men were dressed in camouflage uniforms. CPJ urges Indonesian military authorities to investigate any possible misuse of press vehicles by security forces or militias. Such practices endanger the lives of all working journalists, who may be mistaken for combatants.

Some reporters are worried that the military's practice of "embedding" Indonesian journalists puts them at greater risk of being targeted by rebels because the journalists may not be seen as neutral observers. Embedded journalists who travel with the units during military operations wear special uniforms that are barely distinguishable from those worn by soldiers, further complicating the issue. GAM reportedly has a list of the embedded journalists, and one rebel commander told a foreign correspondent that GAM considers these reporters to be legitimate military targets.

GAM rebels did detain one Indonesian journalist last week and only released her after she managed to convince them that she was not part of the embedded program. The Jakarta Post reported that the military evacuated an embedded journalist after learning that GAM rebels were looking for her.

CPJ sent a letter last week to Indonesian president Megawati Sukarnoputri raising concerns about efforts by military authorities to curb the media in Aceh. We have not received a response.

"CPJ once again urges Indonesian authorities to guarantee that security forces will not interfere with press freedom," said CPJ executive director Ann Cooper. "Furthermore, we call on officials to do everything in their power to guarantee the safety of journalists covering this conflict."

Journalists regret media restrictions

Jakarta Post - May 31, 2003

Jakarta -- A group of journalists associations revealed on Thursday a series of violent incidents and restrictions imposed on journalists covering the military operation in Aceh which began on May 19.

The press association, grouped under the Coalition Against Violence Toward Journalists, said restrictions to press freedom and abuses came from both warring parties in Aceh.

In their statement, the coalition urged both the Indonesian Military (TNI) and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) to protect the press in line with the 1949 Geneva Convention.

The coalition consists of the Alliance of Independent Journalists, Indonesian Television Journalists Association, Indonesian Press Association of Reform, Indonesian Photo Journalists and Southeast Asian Press Alliance.

It said the restrictions imposed on the press started when the martial law administrator in Aceh, Maj. Gen. Endang Suwarya, asked the media on May 20 not to quote statements from the Free Aceh Movement (GAM). He also disclosed a plan to curb news coverage in the war-torn province. Under martial law, the military enjoys extraordinary powers to restrict or ban the press.

Another form of restriction, the coalition said, came when TNI stipulated on May 25 that all journalists had to report to the military before covering the operation in a bid to prevent "internationalization" of the Aceh case.

TNI chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto added to the list of restrictions on May 26 when he said he would sue print or broadcast media that failed to provide facts in their reports on the conflict. Endriartono also asked the media to sacrifice the principle of covering both sides for the sake of nationalism.

Aside from the restriction, journalists have also been the target of violence while covering the conflict, the coalition said.

On May 20, an employee of state television channel TVRI in Banda Aceh, identified as Muhammad Jamal, was abducted from his office. His whereabouts and the motives behind his abduction remain unknown, while TVRI has refused to give more details.

On May 21, the transmission pole of the state-owned radio RRI was burned by unidentified group in Indrapuri district in Aceh Besar, some 25 kilometers east of Banda Aceh. RRI repaired it the next day.

A car carrying a reporter of private TV station TV7, Wahyu Mulyono, was shot at by an armed group on May 22 while passing Sigli en route to Banda Aceh. He escaped unhurt.

On May, 23, a car carrying a journalist of private television station RCTI Wayan Astapala was also shot in the same area. Wayan survived.

The next day, there were two shooting incidents aimed at journalists, including The Jakarta Post's Nani Farida, as well as threats against two local radio stations.

The coalition also noticed that on May 26, five journalists of Koran Tempo daily were questioned until late into the night by the military in Lhokseumawe following their report on civilian causalities at the hands of the military. Later on the military announced a plan to sue the daily.

The coalition asked journalists covering the Aceh war to comply with professional standards of reporting only facts and not propaganda from either party.

It also called on owners of print and broadcast media enterprises to send experienced journalists to cover the conflict as well as to fulfill their rights, including life and accident insurance cover and provide them with safety devices.

Meanwhile, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) cited at least six cases in which unknown gunmen opened fire on convoys of both foreign and Indonesian journalists, describing the attacks as "alarming".

"CPJ has documented a series of alarming incidents in which journalists have been targeted while driving on the main road between the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, and the town of Lhokseumawe" in North Aceh, a CPJ statement was quoted by Agence France-Presse as saying. None of them was hurt, the group said.

"We are also gravely concerned by mounting evidence of a systematic effort by Indonesian security forces in Aceh to restrict reporting on the fighting there," it said.

Media told to support operation

Jakarta Post - May 31, 2003

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, Jakarta -- Pressure is mounting on the Indonesian media to support the military offensive against the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), with the government insisting that national integrity should come before press freedom.

Asking the media to develop what he called patriotic journalism, State Minister of Communications and Information Syamsul Mu'arif told journalists on Thursday not to give media space to the separatists.

Syamsul said information coming from GAM "always contains insinuation and psywar" with questionable accuracy and motives. "We ask the media to be wise. Frankly, publishing statements from GAM will only hamper the [military] operation and alienate the TNI from the people," he said, referring to the Indonesian Military.

He acknowledged the efforts of Indonesian media in covering both sides during the operation to quell Acehnese rebels, but claimed that the principle was not relevant in the event of separatism. "Covering both sides is aimed at developing objectivity. But when it comes to separatism, it [the principle] might be damaging," he asserted.

The government has imposed martial law in Aceh, giving the military extraordinary powers that allow it to, among other things, restrict the press or to go as far as order a news blackout. A few days after martial law took effect, the administrator of martial law in Aceh instructed the media in the province not to quote statements from GAM.

Almost two weeks since the military operation began in the province, the Indonesian media appears to have complied with the instruction. Syamsul hailed the way the Indonesian media was covering the military operation in Aceh, but noticed "negative information which is based on unreliable sources".

Press freedom has been put to the test after the TNI disclosed a plan to sue Koran Tempo daily and AFP news agency for reporting the deaths of civilians at the hands of TNI troops in the regency of Bireuen last week. The decision came after the TNI conducted an investigation to verify the report.

Later in the day, Syamsul attended a closed-door meeting hosted by TNI Commander Gen. Endriartono Sutarto with media chief editors.

Like Syamsul, Endriartono reminded the media to work "within the framework of the unitary state of Indonesia". "In solving the Aceh case, public support plays a major role. If Indonesian media report news coming from GAM, we should question the depth of their nationalism," he told reporters after the meeting.

In a bid to secure international support in the Aceh conflict, Syamsul said the government planned to hire an international public relations firm. "We are weak in international public relations as foreign press coverage on Aceh has been giving a negative impression of the operation in Aceh," he said.

Yasril Ananta Baharudin, a member of the House of Representatives' information and foreign affairs commission, said the government had failed to gain public support for the integrated operation in Aceh. He suggested that the government emulate the United States, which set up media centers to sway public opinion during its attack on Iraq.

Another legislator representing the TNI, Maj. Gen. Slamet Supriyadi, urged the Indonesian media to make national interests a priority. "There should be no "cover both sides" for the sake of national interests," he said.

Aceh: Wary looks reveal grim memories of horrors past

Straits Times - May 31, 2003

Banda Aceh -- An Acehnese joke: Why does an Acehnese with dental problems leave Aceh to get treatment? Punchline: Because he's not accustomed to opening his mouth on his home ground.

Visitors to Aceh notice the stares the locals give them. There is more than just curiosity in those looks. Coffeeshop owner Abdullah says: "Who knows? Strangers could be intel [undercover agents]. We watch what we say in front of people we don't know. Many people have disappeared. Many corpses have turned up on the side of the road. The Indonesian military has done very evil things in the past," he said.

Beyond that, however, Mr Abdullah and many others share no affection for GAM rebels they say have become preoccupied with political ideology. If Aceh were offered a referendum on its future, Mr Abdullah, 45, says most people would opt for independence, but would not associate freedom with GAM.

The good news for Jakarta is that there is willingness in Aceh to give another chance to Indonesia and its offer of special autonomy. Mr Abdullah said: "We will accept Jakarta's rule, but only if we have more say in what happens locally. It is also important for the people to actually benefit from Aceh's wealth, which up until now has been stolen by the Indonesians."

Civilians are caught in crossfire of loyalties

Straits Times - May 31, 2003

Robert Go, Banda Aceh -- Soldiers and policemen strut about in battle gear, machine guns slung from their shoulders and holstered pistols at their waists. They can be seen manning posts, drinking coffee at street stalls, or browsing through stacks of video compact discs in front of supermarkets.

But if many of the residents of Aceh share a deep resentment for them and Jakarta's rule, they also have misgivings about the presence of the rebels. Stories suggest that outside of safe areas, civilians are caught in the middle of a free-for-all between Indonesian forces and GAM rebels.

The rebels command popular support in several economically depressed areas of Aceh, but indications are emerging that people in other areas do not sympathetise with their cause.

The flag issue may illustrate the point: Reports are surfacing about villagers who are confused about which flag to fly in front of their homes. Indonesian soldiers tell them to show allegiance to Indonesia's red-over-white national flag. But residents say OTKs come and terrorise those who do that. Villagers also talk about GAM members who demand protection money, and threaten violence if people refuse to cooperate.

In the latest such case, rebel squads kidnapped 10 villagers on Tuesday last week and demanded one million rupiah (US$100) ransom from each victim's family. A Banda Aceh-based academic, who declined to be identified, argued: "They don't see any other way of surviving, so they use civilians as shields. If non-combatants get killed, GAM should share as much of the blame as soldiers who shoot them."

The silent sufferers

Straits Times - May 31, 2003

Robert Go, Banda Aceh -- Ten-year-old Embrianda Hassan stayed up later than usual on Tuesday last week.

At 10pm that night, his school building burned like a tropical fever in the clear sky. Arsonists had tossed bags full of petrol onto its roof, setting it ablaze. On a steamy afternoon three days later, the fourth-grader played hide-and-seek among the smouldering ruins. White ash, the remains of books stacked in the former library, clung to his feet.

Embrianda said he is still attending school, but not at his home village of Mido, near this provincial capital of Aceh. He and friends walk several more kilometres each day to one of the few buildings missed by the arsonists' spree which destroyed more than 380 schools in the province.

Mr Rusli Abdullah teaches religion at a high school which was also burned down by unidentified men during the first week of Indonesia's martial law operations in Aceh. He said he believes rebels belonging to the Free Aceh Movement, or GAM, are responsible for the atrocious attacks.

He said: "This is something that GAM has done in the past. The rebels target schools because they think these are where Indonesia brainwashes Acehnese children." But Mr Rusli said some of his colleagues support the rebels' counter-claim that the attacks were orchestrated by Indonesian forces. They blame the notoriously undisciplined mobile police brigade, or Brimob.

The torching of schools, the very backbone of a society's future, underscores just how blurred the battle lines are here. It is hard to tell the good guys from the bad.

What is clearly emerging in Aceh, however, is that Indonesia's return to military operations against separatist rebels spells dark days ahead for the region's ordinary people.

Journalists who ventured out of the relative safety of Banda Aceh brought back stories of massacres and summary executions of villagers by soldiers. Other reports detail abductions of people who appeared to be non-combatants and discoveries of corpses, some shot and others exhibiting signs of torture, on roadsides.

Envoy 'disappointed' by Annan's statement on Aceh

BBC Worldwide Monitoring - May 31, 2003

[Excerpt from report by Indonesian Detikcom web site on 30 May.]

New York -- United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has expressed his deep concern about the civilian victims of violence in Aceh. Furthermore, Annan has received reports of extra judicial killings and the burning of hundreds of schools. This was announced by a spokesman for Kofi Annan in UN Headquarters in New York today (Friday 30 May) Indonesian time.

"The secretary-general is reminding all sides involved in this armed conflict of their obligation to provide protection for the civilian population," said the spokesman. In his statement, Annan also called on the Indonesian government to make sure that security conditions were sufficient to allow the international aid agencies to have safe and unrestricted access to the people in the community who were being hit by the impact of the fighting.

Indonesia's permanent representative in the UN, Ambassador Slamet Hidayat, expressed his disappointment over the Annan statement. Slamet said that Annan's statement could lead the international community to believe that people were being murdered in Aceh.

"Although he is not making accusations, his statement could lead the international community to believe that there were civilians being murdered.

In fact, as has been said by the TNI Indonesian National Military Forces, there has been one such instance and it was now under investigation," Slamet told Detikcom.

Slamet said therefore that he would be asking the UN secretariat to immediately clarify the background to the statement. He wanted to know the basis and source of the report. "Just maybe the source was foreign media outlets who had reported stories of killings which were based on no firm evidence," he suggested."

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo Interview

SBS Dateline - May 28, 2003

Ten days ago Indonesia launched a full-scale military invasion into the northern province of Aceh, just hours after talks broke down between the government and the Free Aceh movement. Aceh has now been subjected to aerial bombing and 30,000 to 40,000 Indonesian troops are on the ground. Accounts of civilian executions and other atrocities are now being widely reported. Indonesia's chief negotiator in the failed peace talks was Wiryono Sastrohandoyo. Mark Davis spoke to him a short time ago in Jakarta about the slide into war.

Mark Davis: Wiryono Sastrohandoyo, welcome to Dateline. There was some sense of optimism in the past year that there'd be a peaceful solution in Aceh. That optimism has disappeared almost overnight. Diplomats such as you have been replaced by a full- scale military assault. Did the speed of that change surprise you?

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo, Indonesian Aceh negotiator: I think the simple problem is that the other side, that is the rebels, the Free Aceh movement, did not sincerely sign the agreement and implement it. So after five months or even almost six, you know, the other side has not placed their weapons, and they continue to talk about independence and while have accepted the autonomous scheme. So the whole situation becomes untenable for the government and we cannot just continue to tolerate this kind of behaviour.

Mark Davis: Well, the Free Aceh movement make exactly the same accusation against you and Indonesia army and your delegation, that you sabotaged the talks.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: And that is why we ask for the joint council meeting, because they were blockading the implementation at the level of the joint security committee. And I went to Geneva on 23 April and they suddenly changed the date to 27. We could not have a meeting in Geneva so we come again to Tokyo. That is the goodwill of the government.

Mark Davis: This argument over the dates is starting to sound a little bit petty on both sides. But what the Free Aceh movement claim is that the Indonesian Army deliberately launched attacks in Aceh on the eve of these discussions to sabotage them.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: We have exhausted all efforts for peaceful solution. So we have been very patient. We have waited for five months and it is supposed to be at least storing weapons 20% each month. For three months, not a single weapon has been placed. If they have any accusation about or objection or grievances about the implementation of the Indonesian Government, we can discuss that, and that's why we want to have a meeting of the joint council.

Mark Davis: But you're not discussing it, you've launched a full-scale military invasion. This is quite a dramatic backflip.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: No, no, no. You are completely mistaken. You see, the government has a 4-point program. The first is the humanitarian operation, second is the upholding of justice and the law operation, three is to make the government more efficient and fourth only is the military security operation.

Mark Davis: And what are we seeing today? You've moved from number one to number four very quickly.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: Well, there are -- number one, number two is in progress also, but, of course, the media is only reporting on number four.

Mark Davis: Well, because number four is very clearly happening. You've got 30,000 troops there, aerial bombings, you've got civilians dying.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: I know. But, you know, the 16th president of the United States, to preserve the union, also used force whenever the efforts for peaceful solution are already exhausted.

Mark Davis: The Free Aceh movement, their most serious accusation is that the army deliberately provoked attacks...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: You seem to be with the Free Aceh movement and you don't want to be objective.

Mark Davis: I'm not with either side, sir, but I'm just suggesting that given the historical and recent record...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: All right, but also observe the fact that the government is trying everything to do, to have it settled peacefully.

Mark Davis: Well, you've written...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: We have been trying it for three years. We have negotiated since the year 2000 and we have an agreement in December last year which is not being implemented by the other side.

Mark Davis: Well, you've written with some candour about the atrocities that occurred against the Acehnese people under President Suharto -- how is it any different today, with...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: In any situation of conflict -- in any situation of conflict, the first victim is always human rights and that's why we want to correct that situation. And it is not being responded properly.

Mark Davis: Sorry, I'm confused, how are you correcting that situation today? There's civilians being killed, there's reports of children being killed...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: We have tried for three years. We have negotiated a document that is signed but they don't implement it. They accept it, autonomy, but they keep on talking about independence, they even appointed a governor and everything, you know, setting up rival government. Now, that is very inconsistent to the agreement.

Mark Davis: So you support the move from a diplomatic solution to a military solution that's occurred in the past fortnight?

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: It is something that cannot be, you know, put aside. We prefer diplomatic solution and we sign an agreement and we are implementing the agreement. Now, if the other side wants to have verification and so on or to improve the implementation, that's what we are going to discuss in Tokyo.

Mark Davis: When the chief of the armed forces addressed his commanders in Aceh two weeks ago, he was quoted as saying "You're...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: You seem to be only interested in pointing fingers at my government.

Mark Davis: Well. it's more than pointing a finger, sir. His declaration was "You are trained to kill, so wipe them out."

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: No, we are not trying to kill, we are trying to preserve life.

Mark Davis: Yeah, so explain that to me.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: Yes, of course, that's why we have a humanitarian assistance operation, we have the law upholding justice operation, and we want to be correct, you know.

Mark Davis: This doesn't seem consistent...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: ... body with the law.

Mark Davis: It doesn't seem consistent with the reports that are coming out of Aceh at the moment, sir.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: Well, the reports -- I know -- and ... we are doing it not with great enthusiasm, you know, but the other side is, you know, it has to be implementing what it has signed.

Mark Davis: There are some...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: It is a matter of -- it's a simple problem of implementing an agreement -- that's it.

Mark Davis: There are some...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: An agreement that they've signed on 9 December and which they didn't implement until now.

Mark Davis: Sir, both sides are making this accusation at the moment.

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: Look, what I'm trying to do is to clarify the issue and not to have an argument with you or polemics with you.

Mark Davis: Well, there are some...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: Otherwise we may as well end it -- otherwise we may as well end this interview. Thank you very much.

Mark Davis: Sir, there are some remarkably brutal officers in the Indonesian army. Do you have any confidence...

Wiryono Sastrohandoyo: You seem to be still only on accusing my government. You don't want to see the other side. I think this is enough. I'm sorry, thank you.

Mark Davis: Thanks for joining us, sir.

Aceh: Jakarta's misguided optimism

Asia Times - May 29, 2003

Phar Kim Beng, Hong Kong -- Aceh, like East Timor, has seen its share of separatist problems for the greater part of the past 30 years. Located in northern Sumatra, gas-and-oil-rich Aceh has also become the scene of one of the most neglected conflicts in Southeast Asia, certainly less conspicuous than the running battles between Manila and Mindanao.

Now that East Timor has become independent of Indonesia, however, the sights of the Indonesian military have been trained, once again, on Aceh, an area known as Serambi Mecca (The Gateway of Mecca) for its austere version of Islam.

Because of lower visibility, the separatist problem in Aceh creates an environment for numerous human-rights abuses, an endemic condition that is certain to continue into its 28th year as the Indonesian army attempts to subjugate the separatist rebels of GAM (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, or Free Aceh Movement) by landing more troops.

While Indonesians in general are aware of the human-rights abuses perpetrated by their army, most continue to see the insurgency in Aceh as the most serious challenge to the republic's territorial integrity yet. Many believe it ought to be put down. What is more, Aceh is one of Indonesia's richest provinces, accounting for between 11 and 15 percent of Jakarta's total export earnings in oil, gas and timber. The incentives to retain Aceh have never been stronger.

Lately, there is also another reason why Indonesians are getting more impatient with the long-running Aceh conflict. The "loss" of East Timor, Sipadan and Ligitan in recent years, the latter two islands to Malaysia in a ruling by the International Court of Justice in The Hague, has heightened nationalist feelings too, making compromise between Jakarta and GAM almost impossible.

The efforts of the Henri Dunant Center in Geneva to mediate the conflict between GAM and Jakarta has been seen not only as meddlesome but as another conspiracy to chip away at the sovereignty of the republic.

In the interim, several factors continue to lend themselves to allowing the Indonesian army to have a greater say on how the Acehnese conflict should be resolved militarily. Very crudely, they form the dynamic of the Aceh conflict.

First, GAM's small size, composed of just 500-800 hardcore members, continues to lull ambitious Indonesian army generals, as well as civilian office seekers, into believing that a military solution is within grasp if proper number of troops can be deployed -- that as long as more forces are used, GAM can be put down.

Indeed, even given the most positive estimate, independent analysts believe that GAM has about 2,000 members at the most. Given that Aceh has a total population of up to 4.3 million, the small proportion of Acehnese who belong to GAM leads -- or misleads -- the Indonesian army into believing that GAM lacks representative legitimacy and support. Triumph cannot be a distant goal if they are given a free rein by Jakarta to snuff out GAM. Little attention is paid to the possibility of GAM mixing with the local population, a tried and tested guerrilla tactic of the Viet Cong at one stage.

Second, while GAM's military training and supply once came from Libya in the late 1980s, this option has since been curtailed. GAM also procures its weapons in the black market, namely in Cambodia and Thailand, two countries whose leadership, in the name of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) unity, have been dissuaded by Jakarta from providing any material support.

Together, these are supply lines that the Indonesian military believes it could effectively interdict, hence emboldening it to use force to deal with GAM whenever patience runs thin, as was occasioned by the collapse of the recent talks in Tokyo.

Aside from that, there is the strong ethnic identity of the Acehnese, reinforcing the argument of the Indonesian army that GAM has to be crushed lest it further rallies other Acehnese to its side.

Jakarta has bought into each of the arguments put forth by the Indonesian military. This is because of the widespread perception that that GAM -- not Acehnese -- is fighting to claim the enormous natural wealth in the area. Nor, according to Jakarta, is GAM fighting in the name of Islam, since Jakarta has on several occasions agreed to allow the Acehnese to have greater autonomy to implement Islamic law, yet such gestures have time and again been turned down.

In the eyes of Jakarta, GAM's bad faith was most apparent after the signing of the demilitarization agreement last December. Instead of laying down their arms gradually, GAM openly rallied the people to seek complete independence from Indonesia in next year's general election. GAM, in other words, tried to use the window of opportunity to gain political legitimacy to challenge the rule of Jakarta.

In the view of Jakarta, GAM has broken not only the peace but also Indonesian laws that are clearly opposed to allowing any elements to promote independence or separation.

On the part of Aceh, the excesses of the Indonesian army are clearly too bitter to swallow. Up to 12,000 civilians have perished. Human Rights Watch in 1999 catalogued no fewer than 7,000 cases of serious human-rights violations by the Indonesian military in Aceh since anti-separatist operations were launched in 1979. Such excesses engendered increased support for GAM and its violent separatist agenda, which has included plenty of human-rights violations of its own.

If anything, despite the fall of the Suharto regime in 1998, the reputation of the Indonesian army as a trigger-happy force remains entrenched in Banda Aceh and other surrounding areas.

For instance, 24 soldiers and one civilian were convicted in May 2000 of the massacre of 57 Aceh villagers. However, the court did not charge or indict any senior officers in the chain of command. The highest-ranking officer involved, a lieutenant-colonel, disappeared before the legal proceeding began and has yet to be found. Such half-measures have not pacified the Acehnese.

To be sure, the relationship between Jakarta and GAM has little prospect of improving in the near future now that martial law has been imposed for six months. Suspicions over the motives of the Indonesian army continue to prevail.

A rally in Bireuen regency held to celebrate GAM's 24th anniversary on December 4, 2000, for example, was attended by 500-1,000 uniformed GAM troops. Although the Indonesian security forces did not intervene, some GAM members returning to their home districts after the rally were killed in a clash with government forces in eastern Aceh.

Indeed, General Ryamizard Ryacudu, currently the army chief leading the offensive in Aceh, has affirmed that if need be, martial law can be repeatedly imposed after the lapse of six months.

For those who expect to see some form of peace in Aceh in the near to mid-term, they should not hold their breath. The problem is more convoluted than is otherwise presented by the Indonesian military, that it is a simple separatist problem with a small number of GAM rebels. If anything, it is becoming an enduring conflict because of its complex features, especially after GAM has successfully infiltrated into the Aceh population at will -- a tactic that leaves the Indonesian army hapless as it can't separate GAM from the non-combatants.

The Acehnese themselves do not appear ready to settle for autonomy, as reflected by the huge support given to an independence rally in Banda Aceh, the provincial capital, in November 1999, then again in November 2000. With crowd estimates ranging up to a million, both events were the largest demonstrations of public separatist sentiment in Indonesian history. Given such numbers, GAM believes, correctly or otherwise, that it has the upper hand if the conflict is to drag on indefinitely.

When the Indonesian army continues to commit security excesses, as GAM predicts it will, despite repeated disclaimers from Jakarta, then half its battles are won in the hearts and minds of the Acehnese, given Aceh's proud anti-colonial history to resist what is often deemed as Jakarta's attempt to impose Javanese rule on Aceh.

Indeed, while GAM may be small, it can continue to draw on large support, even if not all Acehnese are in favor of independence or the imposition of Islamic law. GAM's goal is not necessarily to evict the presence of the Indonesian army as it is to draw Acehnese into hating the forces sent by Jakarta.

Indonesia's Aceh haunted by past, fears future

Reuters - May 29, 2003

Dean Yates, Banda Aceh -- Their allegations of Indonesian military brutality cannot be verified, but the pain etched on their faces is real. So are the tears, the quivering voices and the vacant stares.

In separate interviews, four Acehnese villagers told the story of how their lives had been ruined a few years ago, forcing them to flee and eventually find shelter in Banda Aceh, the capital of Aceh province on the northern tip of Sumatra island. Three blamed Indonesian soldiers, the other, unknown men.

For them, hopes of returning home to rebuild their lives has been dashed by the military's biggest offensive ever against Free Aceh Movement rebels, now in its second week, following the collapse of a peace pact.

Like many of Aceh's four million people, they want peace, an end to abuses by both sides, an end to fear. The independence sought by the rebels for 27 years or the special autonomy offered by the government means little.

Acehnese on the streets of Banda Aceh say much the same thing. They are sick of the fighting that has killed 10,000 people since 1976.

Asked if Acehnese wanted independence or special autonomy, Muslim cleric and academic Yusny Saby laughed loudly. "For the ordinary Acehnese like you and me, we want peace, we want security, we want prosperity, we want good education, we want a good economic life, we want job opportunities," he said.

Among the four villagers, one man in his 50s said he was taken to a military post in 2000 where soldiers demanded to know where his rebel flag and gun were. "They beat me with a block, they beat me with an iron bar. I was kicked by many people, I don't know how many," said the man, who asked that his name not be used. He said soldiers released him after a day. About two months later, his house was burned down. He did not know by whom.

Winning support?

Fighting back tears, a woman in her 30s said one day in 2001 her husband was taken by unidentified men. In panic, she fled into the jungle with her four children. "We spent seven days and nights in the jungle with no food or water," said the woman. She said she was pregnant at the time and never saw her husband again.

Indonesia's military denies committing systematic rights abuses although it has admitted troops have occasionally intimidated civilians. Military officials say the purpose of the new combined security and relief operation is to win popular support, and they are doing their utmost to avoid civilian casualties and will punish transgressors.

But within days of an offensive that has killed scores and made thousands refugees, an account emerged of soldiers executing civilians. The military said an investigation found that to be false and it would take legal action against those responsible for the reports. The rebels too are accused of rights abuses and extortion, leaving many people afraid to talk with reporters for fear of reprisals from both sides.

Aceh has a long history of fighting outside rule and is proud of its Islamic traditions, culture and distinct language. Jakarta tried to tap into that in 2001 when it gave Acehnese a greater share of their wealth as part of an autonomy package.

But Acehnese say they have seen few benefits and have rejected the renaming of the province Nanggroe Aceh Darrusalam -- "Peaceful Land of Aceh" -- and the introduction of Islamic law as window-dressing.

While people in Banda Aceh go about their lives and shops are open, soldiers patrolling the outskirts look tense, checking vehicles and quizzing drivers. Saby said the fear was worse than ever. "That is what I can sense from the heart of the people."

Government claims early success in Aceh operation

Jakarta Post - May 29, 2003

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jakarta -- Despite several shortcomings, the government said on Wednesday the ongoing military operation to crush the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) in the province had been nothing but a success and was moving faster then expected.

Overlooking the failure to save more than 300 schools from arson attacks, the food distribution crisis and the flow of thousands of refugees in the past 10 days, the government said the operation had given it the upper hand.

The Indonesian Military (TNI) Commander Gen. Endriartono Sutarto said that in the first two weeks, the TNI managed to locate and reclaim GAM strongholds across the province.

"Our original plan was that within two months we would identify their (GAM) locations and reclaim them, however we made it in only two weeks," Endriartono told a press briefing that followed a ministerial meeting to evaluate how the integrated operations were progressing in Aceh.

He said in the coming months, the TNI expected to separate GAM members from other members of the community. "We expect that within the next two months, we will manage to force GAM members to stay away from the villages and leave the people alone," he remarked.

TNI has repeatedly blamed the casualties among civilians on the GAM tactic of living among civilians. The military also accused the rebels of employing teenagers as spies.

Regarding the operation to enforce law and order, National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar said so far the police had arrested around 60 GAM members or people linked to the rebels across the country over the last nine days. Some were arrested in Jakarta and some in neighboring towns in Sumatra.

President Megawati Soekarnoputri issued a decree to impose martial law in the province on May 19 after peace talks between the government and GAM in Tokyo collapsed.

The government has now stationed more than 40,000 military and police personnel in the province to fight GAM, which has an estimated 5,000 members. Three days into the military operation, more than 300 school buildings were burned by unidentified people, leaving more than 40,000 students without classrooms.

The first week saw the prices of staple foods increase up to 30 percent as food distribution was disrupted and several trucks carrying food supplies from Medan in North Sumatra were burned along the route.

The latest report from Aceh said that more than 23,000 people have taken refuge, especially around North Aceh and Bireuen regencies, which experience heavy gunfights almost every day. However, none of the top government officials were willing on Wednesday to admit these shortcomings.

The growing fear and anxiety among the Acehnese people since the operation began was not addressed during the meeting either. Endriartono said that so far his soldiers had been carrying out their task well and he once again underlined that he would not hesitate to take stern action against his soldiers who abused people. "If they hurt people, I will not hesitate to shoot them in the head," the TNI chief asserted.

In his report, Minister of Social Affairs Bachtiar Chamsyah dismissed reports of refugees or other Acehnese who were short of food. "We have managed to provide supplies of all necessary food and other basic needs in 13 points across the province. There will be no food shortage," he asserted.

From Banda Aceh, administrator of martial law in Aceh Maj. Gen. Endang Suwarya said camps had been prepared for civilians displaced by war and four million ID cards would be replaced -- signs the assault on separatist rebels is being stepped up.

Sixteen tent camps in nine districts -- including Bireuen, Pidie and North Aceh -- had been erected, he said as quoted by AFP, adding that refugees would be provided with sanitation facilities and temporary classrooms.

The military, aided by provincial administrators, will issue new ID cards for some 4.2 million residents in Aceh next month, Endang said, which signals heightened efforts by the military to distinguish civilians from the rebels. The first phase will affect 1.7 million people.

Endang said "there are no longer heavy concentrations of GAM" but troops will continue operations in several areas because most of them "have blended in with the public".

Acehnese flee their homes in fear of military sweep

Jakarta Post - May 29, 2003

Lhokseumawe -- Fatimah stopped a car carrying several journalists and begged them to load her belongings into the car. "Please take my stuff to the Meunasah [mosque]; I will follow you by bicycle," pleaded a trembling Fatimah.

Fatimah and her teenage daughter decided to abandon their village Krueng in Peudada district, Bireuen regency, on Wednesday after security conditions there worsened. Obviously shocked by the turn of events in her village, Fatimah packed her belongings and headed for a community mosque, located one kilometer from her house.

As the journalists' car stopped, a villager named Ibrahim approached and asked if security in neighboring Lawang village had returned to normal. "Please tell me what's happening there. I wish I could go back to my house but I'm so afraid. I don't have an ID card ... I only have this ... an old one. Can I return to my house?" Ibrahim asked.

As of Wednesday, more than 20,000 people had fled their homes and taken refuge in public buildings.

Residents of Krueng and Lawang villages are living in fear due to rumors that the Indonesian Military (TNI) will launch a massive offensive in their village against the poorly organized separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM), which security officers believe have established bases in the area.

On Wednesday, several journalists went to Krueng and Lawang after learning that local residents there were living in fear of TNI personnel, who apparently do ID checks on residents.

Most residents there have failed to produce ID cards, claiming that separatists took their ID cards. Fearing a military raid, men in the villages have fled into the forests.

Since Jakarta imposed martial law in Aceh two weeks ago, TNI personnel often do ID checks on villagers. Those failing to produce legitimate IDs are branded GAM members.

"My assistant was shot by soldiers ... I'm so afraid. What can I do? Can I go with you to the city?" Ibrahim asked. Only after visiting journalists told him to calm down and stay at the mosque did Ibrahim stop asking questions.

The Aceh Military Operation Command in Lhokseumawe has received a report describing violence committed by soldiers at Lawang village and has ordered a thorough investigation into the matter.

According to Operation Command spokesman Lt. Col. A. Yani Basuki, 66 government troops led by Second Lt. Fuad Suparlan arrested GAM member Abu Bakar alias Abdul Rahman alias Arum, 35.

"When soldiers tried to interrogate him, he tried to escape and kept running even though troops fired warning shots.

"In this case, our soldiers indicated that GAM rebels took ID cards belonging to villagers there," Yani said in response to questions about the incident at a news conference.

"We admit that soldiers were engaged in violence against villagers during a military raid there and we issued a strong warning about their behavior. We also ordered the soldiers' superior to take stern action against them," Yani said.

Asked what punishment would be meted out to such soldiers, Yani said: "It will depend on the results of the investigation conducted by us [the military], as well as several other legal considerations."

Aceh villagers claim military abuse

Associated Press - May 28, 2003

Chris Brummitt, Lawang -- By the time the military arrived at dawn, most men had already fled this isolated village in Indonesia's Aceh province. More than 70 soldiers herded the few that remained, along with the women, into a prayer house.

But what happened next was in dispute Wednesday as the military continued its offensive against separatists in Aceh.

People in Lawang told The Associated Press that troops accused one man, Abu Bakar, 35, of being a rebel and dragged him away Tuesday to a coffee plantation and killed him with shots to the head and chest. But Lt. Col. Akhmad Yani Basuki said the man, a suspected rebel taken away for questioning, was shot when he tried to escape. "He tried to escape. Therefore, he was shot," Basuki said.

The claims by the villagers emerged just over a week into Indonesia's latest campaign in Aceh, a region rich in oil and gas where rebels have sought an independent state since 1976.

Previous bloody incursions into the region have fueled the rebellion, one of several in outlying provinces that threaten to divide the giant archipelago. This time, the government in Jakarta said it hoped to encourage support for the offensive among the 4.3 million people who live in Aceh.

The government has dispatched about 40,000 troops to fight an estimated 5,000 rebels in the northern province.

Foreign governments have supported the offensive, fearing the chaos that would result in the region if Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, were to break up.

However, accounts of military abuses could cause concern in the United States, which is seeking to enlist the Indonesian military in its war on terror after the October 12 bombings on the island of Bali that killed 202 people, mostly Western tourists.

The military says it has killed more than 80 rebels in its latest offensive in Aceh. Reporters are generally barred so independent verification is difficult. Six police and military have also been killed, according to officials.

In Lawang, Abu Bakar's wife, Aisyah, said he was not a rebel. Most men in the village, in a region known to support the insurgency, had already fled into the hills before the troops arrived, villagers said.

"My husband insisted on staying ... he felt he had done nothing wrong," said Aisyah. "He was an ordinary man, a farmer. He wanted to stay to look after his children." Residents said soldiers beat five men with a large wooden block, on which bloodstains were still visible the next day. The soldiers burned two houses and a motorbike, they said.

The military said no weapons were found in the poor cotton- growing village, about 30 miles west of Aceh's northern capital of Lhokseumawe. Yani, who has denied several other allegations of abuse by his troops, admitted some of the soldiers had taken part in "violent actions" and said they would be prosecuted.

In Jakarta, military commander Gen. Endriatorno Sutarto said the government was achieving its objectives in Aceh faster than expected and that there would be larger operations next week.

"The second month target of the operation was achieved in two weeks," Endriatorno said. "The next stage will be to chase away the rebels from residential areas without sacrificing civilians."

Aceh toll mounts but rebels prove elusive

Straits Times - May 29, 2003

Banda Aceh -- Indonesia's military reported increased rebel casualties in Aceh province yesterday but admitted that troops were having a tough time confronting highly mobile guerillas who blended into the population.

Despite this, troops had killed 81 separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebels and arrested 22 others as fighting entered the 10th day, military spokesman Yani Basuki said.

Four soldiers and two paramilitary policemen were killed while dozens of rebels had surrendered, he said. "We're continuing to hunt them until their strength is destroyed," he said.

Lt-Col Basuki said troops had detected GAM strongholds but the rebels were not wearing uniforms and were blending into the population. "They are highly mobile. Besides, they are not wearing uniforms so it's difficult to distinguish them from ordinary civilians," he said.

Soldiers had been ordered not to use their weapons in situations where rebels were mingling with civilians, he said, to prevent the killing of innocent people.

The fight against rebels is not confined to the jungle. Jakarta has started the legal process of prosecuting 18 alleged GAM members for treason and terrorism. The move is part of the government's integrated operations to root out separatism.

The members, who were arrested by the security authorities, include five GAM negotiators from the aborted peace talks with the government.

Considered the core members of the separatist group, the five will be charged with treason and terrorism under a new anti- terrorism law for allegedly being involved in a number of bombing cases. If convicted, they could receive the death penalty. The remaining GAM members will be charged with treason under the Criminal Code.

As the fighting escalated yesterday, foreign aid workers in Aceh were advised by the government to leave the province. Security concerns were cited. The government said that while foreign aid was welcome, it should be channelled through Indonesian aid agencies.

However, the staff of foreign aid groups such as Cardi, London- based Oxfam International and Save the Children remained in Aceh yesterday. "If our headquarters in Jakarta ask us to leave, we will," said one of the aid workers.

Seventeen tonnes of medicine donated by the World Health Organisation and the UN Children's Fund have arrived in the provincial capital of Banda Aceh. "The emergency health kits will be enough to cater for 200,000 people for three months," said Mr Cut Idawani of the provincial health office.

Aceh police name 43 treason suspects

Antara - May 28, 2003

Banda Aceh -- Police in Aceh have named 43 persons linked with separatist movement as suspects for treason.

"Their case will soon be handed over to the prosecutor"s office,' Aceh regional police chief Inspector General Bachrumsyah Kasman said here on Tuesday. He said he would suggest their sentence would be directly implemented soon after it was given.

Kontras should introspect, TNI chief says

Antara - May 29, 2003

Jakarta -- Chief of the Indonesian Defense Forces (TNI) Gen Endriartono Sutarto said human rights group the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) should look into itself following the assault and vandalism by a youth organization.

"We are dealing with an enemy of the nation namely separatist group Free Aceh Movement. If Kontras considers itself as part of the nation, it must do something for the sake of the nation," he said here Wednesday. Endriatono was commenting on the assault and vandalism against Kontras' office on Tuesday.

Some 100 members of a youth organization attacked Kontras' office, and assaulted five staff members for being critical of war in Aceh.

Endriartono said the attacker likely consider Kontras has different mission with the government especially on the Aceh issue. "Not all the government policies are bad, are they. People are fed up," he said.

Jakarta rights group attacked for Aceh stance

Human Rights Watch News - May 28, 2003

New York -- Indonesian police failed to stop two organized attacks on Kontras, a prominent Jakarta-based rights group, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch called for a full investigation into the attacks, which appeared directed at the group because of its work in the embattled province of Aceh. Human Rights Watch also urged protection for all Indonesian non- governmental organizations (NGOs) reporting on the conflict.

"The failure of the police to respond to these attacks on a leading human rights organization sets a bad precedent for all groups working on Aceh. The Indonesian government must ensure that domestic human rights organizations are free to work and report on Aceh in safety, especially now that the province is closed to international monitors." Brad Adams Executive director of Human Rights Watch's Asia division

In separate incidents on May 26 and 27, a uniformed group calling themselves Pemuda Panca Marga attacked the Central Jakarta office of Kontras (Commission for the Disappeared and Victims of Violence). Pemuda Panca Marga is a youth group that Human Rights Watch has reported to be involved in numerous incidents of pro- government violence in the past.

At 2:30 p.m. on May 26, approximately twenty members of Pemuda Panca Marga arrived at the Kontras office and accused staff of pro-separatist leanings and opposing a unitary Republic of Indonesia. Members of Pemuda Panca Marga physically assaulted Usman Hamid, a senior presidium member of Kontras, and burned a Kontras banner. Four police officers present during the attack refused to intervene despite appeals by Kontras staff.

At 12:30 p.m. on May 27, approximately 100 Pemuda Panca Marga members returned to the Kontras office. They physically assaulted three senior members of Kontras, Coordinator for the Presidium of Kontras Ori Rahman, Public Opinion Coordinator Gian Moko, and Usman Hamid. They also destroyed part of Kontras' offices. During the hour-long attack, the police failed to respond to repeated calls for assistance. Two police officers finally arrived a half-hour after the group had dispersed.

Kontras is a widely respected Indonesian NGO with headquarters in Jakarta. It has a long history of monitoring and reporting on human rights violations in Aceh, in part from a field office there. Last week, the Indonesian military commander in Aceh listed Kontras as one of the NGOs that would be monitored for alleged separatist activities.

President Megawati Sukarnoputri declared a state of military emergency for Aceh on May 19, 2003. Since then fighting in the province has escalated. While the province is closed to international monitors, there have been reports of extrajudicial killings, a crackdown on NGO activities, restrictions on press freedoms and insufficient humanitarian assistance for internally displaced persons.

Rights groups slam attack Kontras over its Aceh stance

Agence France Presse - May 28, 2003

International and local human rights activists condemned an attack on an Indonesian watchdog group over its opposition to the military offensive in Aceh.

About 100 uniformed members of a nationalist youth group on Tuesday vandalised the offices of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) and slightly injured five staff, media reports said Wednesday.

The attack on Kontras was prompted by its criticism of a continuing military operation against Aceh separatist rebels, according to group members quoted by the Jakarta Post and Antara news agency.

Kontras's founder Munir, quoted by Antara, said youths were yelling that statements by himself and the watchdog on Aceh were unpatriotic. Witnesses said the attackers were from a group called Pemuda Panca Marga.

Kontras official Orie Rachman, quoted by the Jakarta Post, said the group also visited the Kontras offices Monday to make threats. "Strangely, no police officers were present [on Tuesday] even after we had reported their threat," he said.

New York-based Human Rights Watch, in a statement, charged that police failed to stop the attacks. "The failure of the police to respond to these attacks on a leading human rights organisation sets a bad precedent for all groups working on Aceh," said Brad Adams, executive director of the group's Asia division.

Several local rights campaigners also denounced the attacks. Asmara Nababan was quoted by Antara as calling the incidents a clear example of fascism which could threaten democratisation.

Rights campaigners have frequently been targeted in Indonesia in recent years despite a climate of freer expression since the 1998 departure of dictator Suharto.

Legislators back TNI position against media coverage

Jakarta Post - May 27, 2003

Kurniawan Hari and Muninggar Sri Saraswati, Jakarta -- A number of legislators on Monday regretted most reports on Aceh by both domestic and international media, and demanded the government to find a mechanism to control media reporting in the troubled province.

They said that most media made provocative reports on the military operation and mentioned little about the humanitarian activities and law enforcement programs in Aceh. Sidharto Danusubroto of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) especially criticized a report on television featuring soldiers dragging a dead body.

Fellow legislator Yasril Ananta Baharuddin of the Golkar faction also criticized the media for using the terminology "military operation" instead of "security-restoring operation".

"Operation to restore security is the fourth item on the four- step operation for Aceh. So why has it becomes the main focus?" Yasril asked during a hearing with Minister of Communication and Information Syamsul Mu'arif.

The legislators suggested that Minister Syamsul find a way to control reports from the mass media.

Meanwhile, Slamet Supriyadi from the Military/Police faction added that, for the sake of the existence of the unitary Republic of Indonesia, the national press should write stories that benefit the nation.

Responding to complaints from legislators, the minister said that at present, the government would not impose restrictions on the media. Syamsul said the government could only appeal to the media to provide more coverage on the government's overall program in Aceh, instead of on stories that benefit the separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

"But, if the situation gives the government no other choice, [media] restriction will be unavoidable," Syamsul added.

Separately, Ashadi Siregar, a lecturer at Gadjah Mada University's School of Communication Studies, said on Monday that instead of moving against the media, the government and the military should investigate the alleged human rights abuses in Aceh as reported by the media. "That's what news reports are for," he said, adding that the country should have an independent ombudsman to investigate various media reports that are disputed by the public, including the military.

Ashadi, however, regretted the military's move to question the reports and even threatening to sue the media that carried articles on the military's alleged human rights violations.

Supporting an earlier statement by Press Council chairman Atmakusumah Astraatmaja, Ashadi noted that media reports could not be accepted as truth in a legal sense and therefore, the media could not be required to take legal responsibility for its coverage in Aceh.

Ashadi told media not to be afraid of the military's move if they believed that their reports were based on fact. "This [occurrence] teaches journalists to learn how to research facts from credible sources. They don't have to be afraid if they exercise the basic principle of journalism," said Ashadi, who leads a journalism institution in Yogyakarta.

Indonesia tells foreign aid workers to leave Aceh

Reuters - May 27, 2003

Dean Yates, Banda Aceh -- Indonesia has told foreign aid workers to leave troubled Aceh for security reasons and says Jakarta wants to take over all humanitarian assistance in the province. The warning comes as Indonesia's military announced plans to step up operations against separatist rebels which began eight days ago and have caused dozens of deaths, forced thousands of people to flee their homes and disrupted food distribution.

United Nations aid workers say they have not felt their security threatened by the offensive, but expected to abide by the order. "It didn't directly say a ban, but we have been firmly advised that it would be better for us to cease our functions in Aceh for security purposes," said Michael Elmquist, head of the UN's Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

He was referring to a letter OCHA recieved from Indonesia's chief social welfare minister, Yusuf Kalla. "Our staffers do not feel their safety is in jeopardy but it's the kind of situation where we need to base ourselves on what the government's advice is," Elmquist said.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Marty Natalegawa earlier told Reuters that local government and the Indonesian Red Cross would in future be responsible for distributing all humanitarian assistance in Aceh, Indonesia's westernmost province.

He said foreign aid workers "should be aware of this policy and leave Aceh. Their physical presence and direct contact in Aceh are not needed due to security concerns." The United Nations said the five international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and four UN agencies operating in Aceh -- with around 10 foreign staff in all -- had not been banned from the province, but were given little choice but to leave.

But in Aceh's provincial capital, Banda Aceh, one aid worker said staff had no plans to leave yet. "Everybody is still here. It's just a matter of wait-and-see on what these statements from Jakarta mean." Another aid worker, however, said security was a genuine concern and told Reuters its staff had stopped operating in the field.

Some human rights group officials say they are suspicious of Jakarta's motives, fearing abuses may take place if foreign aid workers are barred from the province.

"This is not about the safety of NGO workers. Without the international NGOs the military will have more space to attack the people," said Munir, of the Indonesian rights NGO Kontras.

Indonesia has military and police forces of more than 40,000 facing 5,000 guerrilla-style fighters of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), and plans to step up its latest offensive against the rebels with more vehicle searches, document checks and patrols.

"These are patrols for making contact, search and destroy ... deliberate attacks, this is part of the intensification," Indonesia's main military spokesman, Major General Sjafrie Sjamsuddin, told reporters in Banda Aceh on Tuesday.

The two sides have been fighting for 27 years in a simmering conflict that has killed more than 10,000 people, most of them civilians, in the province on the northern tip of Sumatra.

Counts of military, GAM and civilian casualties in the latest fighting vary widely, but an Indonesian Red Cross official said on Monday its workers had removed 82 bodies from conflict areas since the military offensive began.

The latest fighting has also forced as many as 23,000 people from their homes and disrupted transportation of supplies and passengers within the remote province. But one international aid agency said there was no food crisis in the province, which had just finished a rice harvest.

The military has said it expects the campaign to last six months, although on Tuesday Indonesia's top commander General Endriartono Sutarto told reporters he thought GAM forces would be reduced significantly within two months and not be in a position to take any initiatives.

GAM wants full independence for the province, rich in oil and natural gas and other resources, while Jakarta is only willing to grant autonomy.

[With additional reporting by Joanne Collins in Jakarta.]

Protests in Jakarta on Aceh

Green Left Weekly - May 28, 2003

Cokro Hamid, Jakarta -- As Indonesian troops launched a full- scale military offensive in Aceh, there have been protests in other parts of Indonesia, especially Jakarta.

Protest and solidarity actions have been organised by the Solidarity Movement with the People of Aceh (SEGERA) and the Ungu Institute, a women's cultural centre.

SEGERA organised a demonstration outside the presidential palace on May 19 and is also involved in organising a public forum to be held in Jakarta on May 27. It has issued a strong statement urging people to reject the opsi militer (military option) as a means to settle the conflict in Aceh. The public forum will also be hosted by the National Student League for Democracy (LMND) and POSRA, a broad coalition of pro-democracy groups opposed to the military option in Aceh.

The Ungu Institute initiated a well-attended night of prayer and solidarity with the Acehnese people on May 20 in the Jakarta Arts Centre. Faiza Mardzoeki, organiser of the event, told the daily Sinar Harapan newspaper: "The women's movement has long demanded the withdrawal of the military from Aceh, but the government and the military have decided to attack." Mardzoeki said the women's movement would try to send aid and volunteers to help the civilian population of Aceh.

On May 23, the Ungu Institute joined with the Red and White Stage cultural group, the JAKER Cultural Network and the Indonesian Women's Coalition to organise another action against the war in Aceh in the centre of Jakarta.

Jakarta declares all-out war in Aceh

Green Left Weekly - May 28, 2003

James Balowski, Jakarta -- Following the breakdown of last-ditch talks in Tokyo between the Indonesian government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), Jakarta on May 19 launched a "security restoration operation" in Aceh -- an all-out military offensive to crush GAM and "resolve" the question of Aceh once and for all.

Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri on May 18 decreed that Aceh is in a "state of emergency" -- and therefore under martial law. The decree authorises the deployment of some 30,000 troops.

Massive military operations -- including rocket and bomb attacks, air, land and sea assaults, and the use of tanks -- are being conducted in six regions of Aceh where GAM is believed to have military strongholds. The Indonesian military (TNI) claims to have killed scores of GAM rebels.

Since the military operation began, 12,000 people have been displaced. Residents in Aceh's towns and cities are only leaving their homes to buy basic necessities, inter-city transport has all but stopped and TNI soldiers at roadblocks are extorting money from the few people who dare use the roads. Some 200 schools have been burned down, with each side blaming the other for the destruction.

The Indonesian government claims its assault on Aceh is an "integrated operation", which will include "humanitarian" aid and the restoration of local government administration. Health minister Achmad Sujudi said his department will spend US$6 million during the first six months of the operation, a fraction of the estimated $200 million the military operation will cost.

In a communique on May 21, GAM "prime minister" Mahmood Malik condemned Jakarta for destroying peace in Aceh: "We appeal to the UN for its immediate involvement in the resolution of the Aceh conflict and for an international fact-finding mission to be sent to Aceh to investigate the crimes against humanity that have been committed."

The May 20 Jakarta daily Kompas quoted TNI chief General Endriartono Sutarto as telling the people of Aceh that "there is no reason to be nervous or frightened because of the declaration of a state of emergency". However, during a tour of Aceh's capital, Banda Aceh, that same day, he urged TNI troops to fight GAM until "your last drop of blood ... Chase them, destroy GAM. Don't talk about it, just finish them off."

Men and boys murdered

Part of the TNI strategy is to "separate" civilians from GAM guerrillas, moving civilians out of "strategic" areas. Troops enter villages and order the women and children to come out from their homes, followed by unarmed men. Theoretically, only GAM fighters then remain. Three days into the war, according to GAM, 50 civilians have already been murdered by Indonesian troops in these operations.

Journalists have been told of soldiers ordering young unarmed men and boys from their houses and shooting them. Radio Australia reported on May 22 that journalists from the Agence France-Presse witnessed 11 bodies near Cot Batee and Cot Ijeuh; several of the victims had been shot in the head.

The majority of stories tell of men and boys being ordered from their homes and led away; they are executed nearby or just disappear.

Major-General Endang Suwarya, the commander overseeing the campaign has insisted: "Absolutely no civilians were killed. We have a list of targets that we want killed or captured. We don't miss or make mistakes." However, foreign minister Hassan Warialda admitted that, as rebels no longer wear military uniforms, it is difficult to distinguish from the local population.

BBC journalist Orlando de Guzman visited the northern village of Mapa Mamplamsome (also known as Cot Rabo), a GAM stronghold. Villagers described how soldiers arrived before dawn on May 21, coming across a group of seven boys and men who were sleeping in a hut near a prawn farm. The soldiers dragged the boys out, lined them up on one of the dykes dividing the ponds and shot them one by one at close range. Three or four others were then told to run, before being shot in the back.

A report by Matthew More in the May 23 Melbourne Age said that more than 30 villagers from the same village were severely beaten by soldiers. More reported that an Indonesian journalist who went to village soon after the killings said soldiers gleefully directed him where to go: "They said, 'We already killed 10 rats over there'."

In response to detailed written questions from the Age, TNI spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Yani Basuki said soldiers had seen three well-known "GAM spies" while on patrol and, following an exchange of fire, killed them and nine others.

As part of its campaign to crush GAM, police have begun rounding up activists, charging them with subversion over their alleged connection with GAM. On May 21, police arrested women's rights activist Cut Askiin, declaring her a suspect in subversion and terror cases in the province. In North Aceh, three people were arrested. Two have since been released.

Suwarya has accused the Aceh Referendum Information Centre (SIRA) -- whose chairperson is currently on trial for violating the law on public rallies -- and the Student Solidarity for the People's Movement (SMUR) organisation of being GAM sympathisers. He threatened to arrest their members if they continued their activities.

Ceasefire sabotaged

On December 9, Indonesia and GAM signed the historic Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (COHA) in Geneva, facilitated by the Geneva-based Henry Dunant Centre (HDC). The agreement required both sides to begin demilitarisation within two months. GAM was to start storing weapons at secret designated sites, while the army was supposed to relocate its forces and change its role "from a strike force to a defensive force".

A Joint Security Committee (JSC) was tasked with monitoring the peace process. Its members were drawn from the TNI, GAM and 50 foreign monitors who represent the HDC.

Although there were numerous violations of the agreement, the first two months saw a dramatic decline in violence. However, Jakarta complained that GAM was taking advantage of the ceasefire to recruit new members, reinforce its positions, collect taxes and take control of government institutions.

On March 3, a mob of around 1000 people attacked the JSC offices in Takengon, the main town of Central Aceh, injuring two representatives. The military claimed the crowd had accused the monitors of failing to respond to complaints about GAM. A similar attack occurred on April 7 in East Aceh.

GAM and human rights organisations accused the military of being behind the attacks. According to a March 7 report by the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras), the March attackers included 500 TNI militiamen and members of the TNI's Strategic Reserves Command (Kostrad).

In response to the attacks, peace monitors were forced to withdraw to Banda Aceh. When asked if the incidents were part of an organised campaign to wreck the peace deal, David Gorman, the head of the HDC in Indonesia, told Reuters on April 9: "It's clear these demonstrations, threats and attacks against the teams are organised and they all have a consistent message. That message has been anti-GAM, anti-JSC and anti-peace process." He declined to name who was behind the attacks.

In late April, Jakarta seized on a request by GAM for a two-day postponement of negotiations in Geneva, scheduled for April 25, to call off talks altogether. GAM was given until May 12 to agree to lay down its arms and renounce its goal of independence for Aceh.

Under increasing international pressure, particularly from Washington and Japan, President Megawati on May 13 allowed government negotiators to meet GAM leaders in Tokyo on May 18. However, just one day before the meeting, police arrested five GAM negotiators in Banda Aceh as they were leaving to catch their flight to Tokyo.

Initially, GAM's exiled leadership in Sweden threatened to boycott the talks, but the May 18 meeting went ahead with the Aceh-based negotiators participating by cellular phone.

After 13 hours of talks, Indonesian government negotiators walked out, claiming that GAM only wanted to talk about "technicalities" rather than the "substantive issues" put forward by the government. Coordinating minister for security and political affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said GAM refused to drop its independence demand.

It is clear that the Indonesian government set out to sabotage negotiations. The COHA was only intended to achieve an end to hostilities. No part of the agreement specified that GAM or Jakarta had to agree on the question of independence or autonomy for Aceh.

In Tokyo, Jakarta set three conditions that GAM could not possibly meet: that GAM accept special autonomy within the republic of Indonesia; that GAM disband; and that its armed wing lay down its weapons and disband.

End military ties

The Australian government has defended Indonesia's actions and said the war will not affect military cooperation with Indonesia. Defence minister Robert Hill said on May 20: "We have taken a decision to work with that part of Kopassus [TNI special forces] that has a counter-terrorism capability ... And that's got nothing to do with the issue in Aceh ... We accept that Aceh is part of Indonesia and that they're right to protect their own internal interests."

While calling for negotiations and the involvement of the UN, Labor's foreign affairs spokesperson Kevin Rudd on May 20 failed to condemn the attack. He stated that "Labor does not dispute that Aceh is part of Indonesia".

Action in Solidarity with Asia and the Pacific (ASAP) has initiated a sign-on statement calling on the Australian government to apply pressure to Jakarta to withdraw its troops from Aceh, end martial law and resume negotiations. It also demands that Canberra end all military and security ties with Indonesia.

TNI to sue 'Koran Tempo' over alleged false report

Jakarta Post - May 28, 2003

Tiarma Siboro, Lhokseumawe -- The Indonesian Military (TNI) will sue the Koran Tempo daily newspaper for allegedly publishing incorrect reports over the killing of 10 civilians during a raid in the first week of a major military operation to rout separatist rebels.

TNI spokesman Maj. Gen. Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin said on Tuesday the military might also consider suing France-based news agency Agence France Presse (AFP), from which Tempo quoted in its story.

"We will officially sue Tempo newspaper because it must be held accountable for the headline," Sjafrie told The Jakarta Post. "Later development does not rule out the possibility of suing AFP." Tempo published the story on May 22, which ran under the headline "Civilians have started to become victims".

Quoting an AFP dispatch, Tempo reported on a military raid which led to the death of 10 civilians, including a 13-year old child in the village of Matam Mamplang in the Bireun regency. It said an 87-strong unit led by Capt. Mahfud Supriadi allegedly shot the civilians during a search for rebels from the Free Aceh Movement (GAM). The report said the 10 victims were guarding a shrimp farm at the time of the attack which occurred early in the morning on Tuesday last week. They were told to stand in a row, then shot one by one.

The story was based on the testimony of Anizar, a villager from Matang Mamplang, who was reportedly a witness. She is also the sister of Chairul Razi, 27, one of the casualties.

Speaking during a press conference, Anizar said that she was not present when the raid took place. "It happened at dawn last Tuesday and all local people stayed indoors when the military began to raid the villages." She said that she heard about the incident from others who told her that her brother Chairul was killed by the military. "I didn't see it by myself. Yes I was interviewed by several foreign journalists and I recounted that story," she explained.

Aceh's Military Operation Commander Brig. Gen. Bambang Darmono said Tempo's news report had prompted him to order a probe into the raid. "We were also curious whether soldiers have committed a [human right] violation because they did not find any weapons with the victims but only seized a walkie talkie," Bambang said during the press conference. According to him, the victims were GAM spies or called contoi who inform rebels of Indonesian troop movements.

He said that when the soldiers arrived at the scene at around 4:30am, they saw two people running away and shouting "watch out .. pai is coming!" GAM reportedly calls Indonesian soldiers pai. Bambang said that the suspected contoi had ignored warning shots and therefore had to be shot as they ran away. Eight others then emerged and they too tried to escape.

The soldiers, he said, opened fire on them and killed them in separate places. Two of the victims were 13-year-old, Anas Munazir, and 17-year-old Nasrullah Yusuf. Bambang said GAM used children as spies too.

But when asked if Chairul could have been a shrimp farmer, not a GAM member, Bambang answered "If he was not a contoi, what was he doing there in the middle of the night?. The shrimp farms are no longer used anyway."

Tokyo meeting doomed to fail from the start

Jakarta Post - May 28, 2003

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jakarta -- It was almost midnight in Tokyo when Indonesia's chief negotiator, Wiryono Sastrohandoyo, waited inside a holding room at the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) office for Free Aceh Movement (GAM) leaders to reply to the third draft of the joint statement to salvage peace in the province.

Wiryono was with the rest of the Indonesian delegation when an official from peace broker the Henry Dunant Centre (HDC) came in and asked him how long he would wait for an answer. "Until hell freezes over," Wiryono answered, pensively.

At home, thousands of miles away, Indonesian Military (TNI) troops in Aceh were ready for an order to fire from their chief, Gen. Endriartono Sutarto, who was in Medan to inspect his troops' preparations for the operation.

A few minutes before midnight, GAM flatly rejected the draft statement, prompting Jakarta to declare martial law in Aceh and a full-blown military operation there. The result of the dialog was something of a foregone conclusion.

An HDC official said that, soon after the meeting, it was difficult to reach a deal, as the Indonesian government had proposed additional terms that GAM was unlikely to comply with.

"The government put forward additional conditions. It made any discussion or dialog impossible," HDC spokesman Andy Andrea said, as quoted by Reuters. "The only reference to acceptance of the autonomy law was a starting point [of negotiation]," he said.

The draft proposed by Jakarta made it impossible for the peace deal to come through, as it simply demanded the dissolution of GAM. Without questioning the Indonesian government's right to defend its territorial integrity, it simply made no sense to expect a 27-year-old separatist movement to give up, just like that, as soon as the government asked it to do so.

The draft statement was changed three times before the peace talks finally broke down.

The initial draft statements obtained by The Jakarta Post suggested that both sides agreed "GAM fully accepts special autonomy within the framework of the Unitary State of Indonesia and consequently agrees not to seek independence for Aceh." It also stressed, "GAM commits itself to handing over immediately its weapons, ammunitions and ordinance and to completing the process by July 9, 2003." To put further pressure on GAM, Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said in Jakarta that a military operation would commence if GAM refused to accept the conditions.

After almost seven hours of discussion, GAM came up with its rejection of the five-point draft, refusing to mention the acceptance of special autonomy in its proposed draft.

"GAM is committed to dropping the armed struggle ... [and] within the context of the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement [COHA], will refrain from advocating independence." The separatist movement also stated that it would agree to lay down its arms only if Indonesian troops reciprocally shifted their position to one of defense.

Answering the second draft, the Indonesian delegation returned it to the GAM delegation, reiterating its demand for GAM to give up the independence bid and disband its paramilitary.

"In this regard, GAM is committed to dropping the armed struggle, to disbanding the "Tentra Negeura Atjeh" [the paramilitary] and to participating in the political process, as stipulated in the COHA." It was the third draft that GAM flatly rejected.

Malik Mahmud, who lives in exile, was quoted by Reuters as saying that his supporters in Aceh would go on fighting "forever, as [long as] the Acehnese people exist". "We have been fighting Indonesia for 27 years ... we are confident that we shall be able to resist it. We have to claim back what it has stolen from us. It is the robber and we have to demand the return of the property that it has taken -- with interest," Malik said.

As the two sides refused to back down on their stance with regard to the independence issue, war began and inflicted more suffering on Aceh's population of four million.

Before his return to Bangkok, head of the international monitoring team of the Aceh peace deal Thai Maj. Gen. Tanongsuk Tuvinum expressed the hope of all that peace be maintained for the sake of the Aceh people. "I think they [the Acehnese] deserve much better, because they have suffered for too long, and too much," he said.

Government starts prosecuting alleged GAM members

Jakarta Post - May 28, 2003

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, Jakarta -- As part of the government's campaign to end separatism in Aceh, the state has begun prosecuting 18 alleged members of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) for treason and terrorism.

All of the suspects were arrested after the government launched a military operation in Aceh on May 16. Those arrested include five GAM negotiators from the collapsed peace talks with the government. They were identified as Teuku Kamaruzzaman, Sofyan Ibrahim Tiba, Muhammad Usman Lampoh Awe, Nashiruddin bin Ahmad and Amni bin Marzuki.

Attorney General M.A. Rachman confirmed that the five GAM negotiators were among the 18 suspects whose dossiers were currently being processed by his office.

The five GAM negotiators will be charged with treason and terrorism under the new antiterrorism law, because their subordinates were allegedly involved in several bombings. If convicted they could face the death penalty. Those suspects not believed to be core members of the separatist group will be charged with treason under the Criminal Code.

Rachman said his office had sent additional prosecutors to Aceh to expedite the proceedings, and would soon send in more prosecutors as needed. "We can always deploy prosecutors from other areas, including from Jakarta," he told reporters after briefing hundreds of prosecutors from across the country at his office on Tuesday.

Also attending the briefing were Coordinating Minister for Security and Political Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar and Minister of Home Affairs Hari Sabarno.

Rachman said his office had assigned more than 50 prosecutors to Aceh. Fifteen of the prosecutors will come North Sumatra and the other 35 will come from other neighboring provinces, as well as from the Attorney General's Office in Jakarta. The Aceh Prosecutor's Office, as with other government institutions in Aceh, has been unable to work normally because of the deteriorating security situation in the province since the collapse of the peace agreement.

Among the 14 district courts in the province, only three of them are hearing cases. However, only the Banda Aceh District Court currently has the ability to hear cases involving suspected GAM members because the other two courts have a shortage of judges. The situation is similar in the province's prosecutor's offices.

The prosecution of the alleged GAM members is aimed at maintaining law enforcement in Aceh, which is part of the government's integrated operation in the province. The integrated operation covers law enforcement, humanitarian programs, the restoration of local administrations and the military operation.

In Banda Aceh, the Aceh Police Headquarters has named another 43 people as suspected GAM members and will soon submit dossiers on them to the provincial prosecutor's office. "We will submit their cases to the prosecutor's office in the near future," Aceh Police chief Insp. Gen. Bachrumsyah Kasman said.

He also said the police had released seven of the 12 university students arrested several days ago for their alleged ties to GAM. "We are still questioning the rest," the officer said.

Mob attacks Kontras over Aceh stance

Jakarta Post - May 28, 2003

Damar Harsanto, Jakarta -- About 100 members of a nationalist youth organization attacked on Tuesday the office of a local human rights watchdog, the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) here and assaulted five staff members for being critical of war in Aceh.

Clad in green military-like fatigues, the gang arrived at noon ostensibly in search of Munir, Kontras' founder who now serves as executive director of another human rights watchdog, Imparsial, but he was not at the office.

The mob identified themselves as the Pemuda Panca Marga, a staunchly nationalistic group whose members are children of veteran soldiers. The youth organization used to be affiliated with the Golkar Party.

On Monday, about 30 members of the group went to the office, on Jl. Cisadane, Central Jakarta, looking for Munir, but could not find him so they became violent.

Munir has lambasted the government for its war in Aceh, and alleged that it should be categorized as a gross human rights violation, which would thwart the development of peace in the province. As of Tuesday, at least 80 people have been killed in Aceh, according to military sources.

Orie Rachman, chairman of the Kontras' presidium, said that during the attack on Tuesday, the group turned violent and vandalized the office, destroying chairs, desks and cabinets, as well as physically assaulting five people. None of the five were seriously injured. "This is the second time they came here this week. Yesterday, they threatened us and said they would come with a bigger mob," Orie said.

After about half an hour, the group left the office in a total mess. "And, strangely, no police officers were present even after we had reported their threat," said Orie. He said that on Monday, four police officers from the Central Jakarta Police Precinct also witnessed the rally in front of the office.

Orie insisted that the assault and vandalism would not affect Kontras' activities in promoting human rights. "We'll submit the case to the police as it is a police obligation to take legal action against the attackers," said Orie.

Meanwhile, Central Jakarta Police chief Sr. Comr. Sukrawardi Dahlan, who arrived on the scene shortly after the group left, claimed that his personnel had failed to appear because they were all in a meeting. Sukrawardi then went on to say that the police were trying to apprehend members of the mob, but that they were outnumbered.

However, he also revealed that he foresaw difficulties in arresting the suspects because the group was protected by the military. He said that instead of directly arresting them, he would formally ask their leader to hand over the suspects in the attack.

Meanwhile, Imparsial's operational director Rusdi Marpaung said the attack on Kontras reflected the heightened political pressure and violence against all institutions promoting human rights and democracy in the country. "But, we won't stop fighting for human rights and democracy due to intimidation," he said.

Separately, Purwandono, from the non-governmental organization Solidaritas Nusa Bangsa, condemned the attack and called it a form of terrorism. "We demand that the police catch those responsible for this attack," said Purwandono.

Timeline of attacks on Kontras

• 2000: A grenade explodes in front of the Kontras office, no injuries
• 2001: A bomb placed at Munir's family home in Malang, East Java but fails to explode.
• 2001: The car belonging to human right activist Jhonson Panjaitan was shot at while parked at the Kontras office, no injuries
• 2002: Mob attacks Kontras office destroys furniture and files
• 2003: Mob attacks Kontras office

Media not to blame for reports on rights abuses

Jakarta Post - May 26, 2003

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, Jakarta -- The media cannot not be required to take legal responsibility for its coverage of the ongoing military operation in Aceh because a news report is not the absolute truth, a practitioner has said.

"Media reports cannot be considered to be the absolute truth because they are based on information from sources," Press Council chairman Atmakusumah Astraatmaja told The Jakarta Post over the weekend.

Courts here, Atmakusumah said, had declared a news report was not the truth in a legal sense. He was referring to the verdict issued by the Central Jakarta District Court on June 6, 2000, that rejected the lawsuit filed by former president Soeharto against Time magazine.

The court turned down Soeharto's lawsuit against Time for libel following the weekly's article that accused the longtime ruler of amassing personal wealth. In their verdict, the panel of three judges ruled that a news report was not the truth in a legal sense.

Atmakusumah likened a news report to an intelligence report, which could not be categorized as a legal truth in court. "People must understand that. Moreover, a journalist has no equipment and legal basis, compared with intelligence officers. A journalist can only interview people, instead of interrogating, to obtain news," he said.

Atmakusumah was commenting on the Indonesia Military (TNI) Headquarters, which recently announced its plan to establish an investigative team to verify media reports on alleged abuses committed by its troops during their operations in Aceh.

The announcement followed media reports on civilian casualties at the hands of the military in Bireuen village on Thursday.

TNI asked on Saturday two Tempo Newsroom journalists to join a military unit to verify the report, although their newspaper in Jakarta printed the report as quoted from AFP. If the team finds the report to be true, TNI will take severe action against the military personnel involved. But if the report cannot be verified, the military will take legal action against the media.

Martial law administrator in Aceh Maj. Gen. Endang Suwarya earlier announced his intention to curb the media covering the integrated operations in Aceh.

Tempo chief editor Bambang Harymurti said he welcomed TNI's decision to investigate the case and encourage the media to help the investigation efforts. "If this is aimed at enforcing the law and justice, we are obliged to help the investigation as far as we can," he told a seminar on Saturday.

Atmakusumah praised the military's willingness to investigate alleged abuses by its personnel. However, he suggested that the military involve independent observers for the purpose. "Why don't they involve the National Commission on Human Rights? It is more capable than journalists, whose main job is to collect news," he asserted.

Sjafrie has said that the military has no authority to involve independent observers in the investigation into alleged human rights violations during the military operation because the authority lies "in the hands of the government."

Both Atmakusumah and Bambang agreed that the media should remain impartial under any conditions, particularly martial law. "Martial law grants the military extraordinary power. That's why the media should provide facts about the conflict in Aceh as transparently as possible, to prevent abuse of power. I'm not anti-TNI or against the Republic of Indonesia, but I believe we can influence the Acehnese to remain with the republic by publishing fair and balanced news," Bambang said.

He urged the media not to consider the Acehnese and GAM as enemies but "brothers and sisters who have lost their way."

Aceh unable to cope as bodies pile up

Straits Times - May 26, 2003

Robert Go, Banda Aceh -- The bodies of two men lay on wooden tables in the morgue at Banda Aceh's main hospital. Both were unwashed and bloodied. One showed severe rigor mortis, with limbs at 90-degree angles to the torso.

According to hospital staff, these were two out of 18 corpses which the Indonesian Red Cross (PMI) had brought in to the morgue since Indonesia's operations against GAM separatist rebels began last week. All 18 had died traumatic deaths. Most of them looked in their 30s. All showed bruises, lumps and other signs of beating or torture.

But morgue workers were too scared for their own safety to elaborate. Instead, they tried their best to counter questions with innuendos, something that the Acehnese have become experts at during the past 26 years of troubles here.

Sixteen people, a staff member said, had died of "excessive loss of blood". Hand gestures and code words suggested that the bodies had small entry wounds and larger exit holes. Another two had symptoms of "a lack of oxygen". At least five of the corpses were delivered with ropes around their necks. The ropes are said to be a signature tactic of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

The word "strangulation" almost came out of the staff member's mouth, but his hand gestures were enough to illustrate the point. He kept mum when asked about the identities of the men and their killers, and whether they were civilians, soldiers or rebels.

He said: "We just take the bodies when the Red Cross brings them here, and don't ask questions. After that, we wash them and get them ready for families to claim."

The bodies illustrate the humanitarian crisis that has befallen Aceh. Many expect the situation to worsen over the coming months as Indonesia intensifies its military operations in the province.

During conversations with senior officials of the PMI, it became clear that the agency was poorly equipped to deal with mounting casualties. The organisation counts only 300 volunteers, approximately 300 available body bags and not nearly enough supplies to deal with the expected numbers of victims.

PMI drector Marie Muhammad has said that 80 bodies were found in conflict areas in Aceh this week. His staff said that thousands more were expected in the next six months.

Mr Sanusi Maha, a PMI spokesman in Aceh, said that without more assistance from Jakarta and abroad, Red Cross workers in Aceh would not be able to cope. "We need more ambulances, emergency kits, personnel, stretchers, and many other things. We are doing our best with what we have, but fear that won't be enough," he said.

The Straits Times visit to Banda Aceh's main morgue was similarly distressing, with hospital workers saying they have only one refrigerator for bodies and can properly keep only two corpses at any time. The morgue usually deals with three bodies a week, but has seen 18 in the past seven days.

If many more corpses pour in over the next few weeks, staff members said, bodies would have to be laid out on the grass lawn surrounding the small building.

Indonesia accused of using British-built Hawks in Aceh

The Times (UK) - May 26, 2003

Tim Johnston, Banda Aceh -- The Indonesian army has been accused of using British-built Hawk aircraft to attack separatist rebels in the province of Aceh. That would contravene an agreement between Jakarta and London that the aircraft would not be used for suppression of internal dissent.

A member of the Free Aceh Movement, which is known as GAM, said that two of the aircraft had been used in an attack on villages near the town of Lhokseumawe yesterday morning. "I saw two Hawks flying and shooting rockets and dropping bombs," said Syukri Ibrahim, who is based in the area. "They say they were attacking GAM, but there are no GAM positions there and we are afraid they might have hit civilians," he said. He could not say whether there had been any casualties.

Spokesmen for the Indonesian army, known as TNI, gave conflicting information. One denied there had been any air attacks; another said what he called "sonic bombs" intended to demoralise the enemy, were dropped in the villages of Sawang and Nissam. An army spokesman in the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, declined to confirm or deny the use of the Hawks, but said it would not in principle present a problem. "TNI will use the planes to protect the sovereignty of Aceh," Colonel Ditya Judarsono said.

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office said that the aircraft had been sold to Indonesia on the understanding that they would not be used against their own people. "Senior members of the Indonesian Government have repeatedly stated that UK-supplied military equipment would not be used offensively or in violation of human rights anywhere in Indonesia," a spokesman said.

The Indonesian army began an assault on the rebels last week and there have already been accusations of human rights abuses including extra-judicial killings, torture and illegal detention.

In 1999, the sale of the Hawks was suspended by Robin Cook, Foreign Secretary at the time, because of concerns over the Indonesian Army's behaviour in East Timor. The Foreign Office said yesterday that the British Ambassador, Richard Gozney, had spoken to the Indonesian authorities on May 20, the day after martial law was declared in Aceh. The Indonesian Ministry of Defence had confirmed that the assurances over the use of British-supplied equipment "remained valid".

The chief spokesman for the Indonesian Army, General Sjafrie Syamsoeddin, saw no problem with the use of the aircraft. "For us we have already paid, so there is no problem," he said. "We use fighters to defend our sovereignty and against a sovereign target."

Indonesia has been trying to crush the separatist movement in Aceh for decades. Human rights organisations say that 12,000 people, most of them civilian victims of the army, have died in the fighting.

Military sales:

• A deal to sell 16 Hawk jets (worth 160 Pounds million) and 50 Scorpion armoured vehicles (worth 100 Pounds million) that was approved by the Conservative government, has been honoured by Labour.
• Pre-1997 contracts also honoured include a deal for seven tactical water cannons and more than 300 armoured vehicles.
• Sales including armoured vehicles equipped with machine guns, military communications, Rapier missiles and Sea Wolf launchers, parts for jet components and electronics.

Aceh food crisis looms after supply lines are cut

The Independent (UK) - May 27, 2003

Kathy Marks, Banda Aceh -- The group of men drinking coffee at a roadside stall sprang out of their chairs as the convoy of trucks and buses passed by in a cloud of dust. They had seen little traffic on the main highway through Indonesia's Aceh province since martial law was declared a week ago. "Bringing food, Insyaallah [God willing]," said one elderly man, placing his palms together.

With civil war raging between Indonesian troops and separatist guerrillas in Aceh, the lorry drivers who bring in staple goods from neighbouring North Sumatra are afraid to ply the route in case they get caught in the crossfire. Food supplies are running low across Aceh, which has a population of 4 million, and the United Nations agency Unicef has warned of a looming humanitarian crisis.

The convoy that left the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, yesterday to pick up supplies in Medan, the capital of North Sumatra, was escorted by a tank, an armoured police truck and an armoured car mounted with machine-guns, with dozens of troops deployed to protect it.

But armed escorts do not guarantee safe passage in these wild times. A separate convoy of 27 trucks that left Medan yesterday laden with food was ambushed by 10 masked rebels of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) south of the city of Lhokseumawe. In the volatile district of Bireuen, a bus and a truck carrying vegetables were set on fire after their occupants had been ordered out.

The Indonesian government, which declared martial law in Aceh last week on the eve of the biggest military offensive against GAM, has been slow to address humanitarian needs. Local officials say a massive relief operation is required, particularly in the countryside, where dangerous conditions have prevented the distribution of food.

Jusuf Kalla, the Social Welfare Minister, has promised to send hundreds of trucks into Aceh in the coming days. But, in a move that dismayed aid organisations, he said that international relief agencies would be required to channel humanitarian aid through the government -- to avoid the perception of outside interference in the conflict.

Banda Aceh, located on the far northern tip of Sumatra island, is experiencing some of the worst food shortages. The arrival of a battered truck at the city's open-air market yesterday sent a wave of excitement through the maze of stalls standing in the shadow of the imposing Baiturrahman Mosque. Two dozen traders crowded around, eager to secure their supplies of tomatoes, red chillies and dried crackers.

One trader, Yunan, said he had been forced to double the price of eggs and cooking oil, two commodities that are particularly scarce. Eggs now cost 800 rupiah each. Limited supplies are not his only concern. "I'm worried because there are so few shoppers," he said. "There is no transport bringing people into town from the countryside."

In rural areas, the plight of civilians grows more acute by the day. Health services have collapsed and the military says 15,000 people have been displaced, although no one -- including the Indonesian Red Cross and the military -- appears able to say where they are.

There are also chilling reports of plans to force thousands of people to leave villages in GAM stronghold areas and intern them in temporary camps to be built on sports fields. Military sweeps would then be launched and anyone left in those districts would be assumed to be GAM members and shot.

The security forces -- which include regular TNI troops and Brimob military police -- are frustrated by the difficulty they face in identifying rebels, who often blend in with the civilian population to avoid detection. All civilians in Aceh have now been ordered to apply for new identity papers signed by local police and military authorities.

In an attempt to scupper the scheme, rebels have been descending on villages and confiscating people's identity cards en masse. Villagers in Simpang Empat became the latest to suffer this fate after being raided by armed men yesterday.

The authorities are also using the cloak of martial law to crack down on human rights workers, whom they automatically regard as GAM sympathisers. Twenty activists were arrested last weekend in Banda Aceh, and 12 students suspected of GAM links were also detained. "We're all worried," said Effie, who works for Flower Aceh, an organisation that campaigns for women's rights.

And, despite Jakarta's insistence that the military operation in Aceh would be transparent and accountable, the media is being seriously obstructed in the province. Every day brings some new and absurd ruling from the military authorities, such as their demand that journalists stop quoting GAM leaders.

Journalists are being routinely prevented from entering villages where alleged military atrocities have taken place. A crew car from Metro TV, Indonesia's largest television network, was fired on when it tried to reach one settlement by a back road. The Independent was questioned for two hours at a military checkpoint and threatened with detention after visiting a village where five men had been shot dead.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists sent a letter to Megawati Sukarnoputri, the Indonesian President, last weekend urging her to order the military to respect press freedoms.

Armed convoys attempt to break blockade

Melbourne Age - May 27, 2003

Matthew Moore, Banda Aceh -- Indonesian soldiers in armoured personnel carriers have begun escorting truck convoys in war-torn Aceh in an attempt to break a blockade by separatists that has cut supplies of food, medicine and other goods to the province's 4.2 million people.

Provincial Governor Abdullah Putih yesterday drove the first of 13 trucks through the outskirts of the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, before farewelling the convoy, protected by 80 armed police and troops, on its 18-hour trip to Medan in North Sumatra to pick up supplies.

Traffic on the Banda Aceh to Medan road, which is the lifeline for the province, has all but ceased since Indonesia renewed its war with separatists a week ago. Yesterday's convoy, and another leaving from Medan, are the first attempt to get supplies in since last week.

Four trucks and a bus that tried to make the journey last week were burnt and drivers have been too afraid to try again. Some petrol stations outside the two main towns are out of fuel and prices of food and kerosene have soared.

Indonesian Red Cross head Mar'ie Muhammad said medical supplies and doctors were needed to cope with the mounting injury toll in the conflict, which Indonesia expects to last for at least six months. "There's no doubt about many casualties. We need more surgeons, oxygen, anaesthetists and equipment," he said.

With more than 350 schools burnt out in the first week of the new conflict, and the burning still going on, temporary schools made of plastic sheeting and bamboo were needed urgently, especially for the end-of-year exams that began yesterday.

With refugees beginning to flood out of some conflict areas, and Government plans to intern up to 200,000 villagers in special camps, sickness was also looming as a major problem, Mr Muhammed said. "Sanitation is poor ... there could be typhoid and cholera," he said.

As the situation for civilians in Aceh continued to deteriorate, the Government announced new restrictions on foreign non- government organisations operating in the province. From this week all foreign NGOs will have to dispense their aid through government offices in Jakarta, the Co-ordinating Minister for Welfare, Jusuf Kalla, said.

"This is to avoid people's perception that foreign hands or foreign efforts are coming into Aceh," he said. "Besides that, we don't want to have an image that the Aceh problem is solved by foreigners." With Aceh under martial law, there are signs that journalists may also lose the freedom they have had to move around.

Chief army spokesman General Syafrie Samsuddin said because of safety concerns all journalists would now have to inform the military of where they were planning to go. In recent days soldiers have refused attempts by journalists to visit two villages where many people may have been killed.

Indonesia moves heavy guns to Aceh fight

Associated Press - May 26, 2003

Chris Brummitt, Banda Aceh -- Indonesia moved heavy artillery into rebel areas of Aceh on Monday, stepping up its offensive against the region's poorly armed separatists.

The Free Aceh Movement said it wasn't intimidated and vowed to keep up its fight for independence in the tiny province. Rebels promised to increase hit-and-run attacks on vehicles plying the main roadways.

"We will resist Indonesia until we are free," said Tengku Jamacia, a rebel spokesman in northern Aceh. "Our soldiers are not afraid. The more Indonesia troops they see, the higher their morale."

Burned-out trucks and minivans littered the roadside between the main cities of Banda Aceh and Lhokseumawe, casualties of the guerrilla-style fighting that has characterized eight days of renewed clashes in Asia's longest running separatist war.

The recent fighting -- between more than 30,000 government troops and about 5,000 poorly armed rebels -- marks the most intense crackdown yet in the oil- and gas-rich province, located on the northern tip of Sumatra, Indonesia's largest island. It also marks Indonesia's largest military operation since it invaded East Timor in 1975.

Military spokesman Maj. Gen. Syafrie Syamsuddin said the government would had learned lessons in the first week of fighting and would launch larger operations against rebels. He refused to elaborate or set a timetable.

"Such a large operation will, of course, get reactions from [rebels]," he said. "If the reaction is aimed at the [military], or the police, that is to be expected. We are worried, though, that it will be aimed at civilians and the media."

More than 21,000 Acehnese have fled their homes in recent days. The military accuses the rebels of burning hundreds of schools and attacking trucks transporting food into the province.

The Indonesian military said it killed at least six guerrillas in battles Monday, bringing the rebel death toll to 75. It said five soldiers and policemen have been killed and 20 wounded. The guerrillas said they have killed dozens of soldiers and accused the military of targeting civilians, a charge the army denies.

Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri ordered the offensive on May 19 after cease-fire negotiations in Tokyo collapsed.

Meanwhile, Indonesia police said they had asked Interpol for help arresting four exiled rebel leaders living in Europe. The wanted men include Hasan di Tiro, who heads an Acehnese government-in- exile in Stockholm, Sweden. Baktiar Abdullah, spokesman for the group, told The Associated Press he and his colleagues were Swedish citizens and had no fear of arrest.

Arrest of rights activists condemned

Jakarta Post - May 27, 2003

A'an Suryana, Jakarta -- A human rights activist criticized on Monday the arrest of Aceh students and rights activists during the first week of a major military campaign against rebels in Aceh, warning it could worsen human rights violations by the military and the police.

"It has long been known that the TNI [the Indonesian Military] has always been reluctant to allow investigations into possible human rights violations," sociologist and human rights activist Otto Syamsudin Ishak told The Jakarta Post. "These arrests are the only way for the security apparatus to limit the access of activists investigating human rights abuses in Aceh." As of Monday, 45 students and activists had been apprehended since the military operation began in Aceh on May 19.

They might have links with Free Aceh Movement (GAM) separatists, said Aceh Police chief Inspector General Bachrumsyah Kasman. Among the 45 suspects, 19 could face charges of subversion.

These include the GAM representatives at the Joint Security Committee (JSC), a forum to implement the now-defunct peace accord with GAM signed in December last year.

The GAM representatives, Teuku Kamaruzzaman, Sofyan Ibrahim Tiba, Muhammad Usman Lampoh Awe, Nasiruddin bin Ahmad and Amni bin Marzuki, were arrested shortly before they tried to leave for the Japanese capital, Tokyo, to attend a last-ditch meeting to save the peace accord.

"Those proven to be members of GAM, or its supporters, will be indicted on charges liable to capital punishment," said Kasman, as quoted by Antara on Monday. Conversely, he added, the police would free any arrested persons with no proven links to GAM.

However, Otto said that human rights activists had been deliberately targeted and thus were liable to false arrest. The detention of human rights monitors, he warned, could give leeway to Indonesian and GAM troops to commit more human rights abuses.

Amnesty International voiced its concern over a surge in abuses since martial law was declared in Aceh on May 19, AFP reported.

"Reports already indicate that this is the case -- that civilians, including children, have been subject to extrajudicial execution, and that many thousands of people have been forced to flee their homes ..." said an Amnesty report at the weekend, which faulted both GAM and Indonesian troops. Journalists covering the war have also been subject to police questioning over reports of human rights abuses by the TNI.

Otto demanded the National Commission on Human Rights (KOMNAS HAM) intervene to protect activists from arbitrary arrest. He added that civil groups at home and abroad were also asked to support their peers in Aceh. He called for pressure to be brought against the Indonesian government to allow human rights monitors free access into the war-torn province.

Assault on Aceh targets students

The Guardian (UK) - May 26, 2003

John Aglionby, Banda, Aceh -- After only a week of its offensive against the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), which military commanders promised would end in the separatists' elimination, Indonesia yesterday conceded it would never defeat the rebel army.

The surprising admission came as the security forces extended to students their crackdown on opposition to the war, with paramilitary police arresting at least 15 people, including Red Cross volunteers and refugees, in a raid on a students' union.

Indonesia's chief military spokesman, Major General Sjafrie Sjamsuddin, said that in "an unconventional operation such as a guerrilla war, no one can eliminate [the enemy] until the last personnel".

The armed forces chief, General Endriartono Sutarto, said last week it was hoped GAM would be crushed within six months. Gen Sjafrie said: "When [Gen Sutarto] said 'crush them to their roots', he meant we can reduce their personnel [and] cut off their lines of command and logistics. We are facing difficulties because GAM are melting into the community. They are taking off their uniforms and hiding their weapons." He denied reports that the 45,000 troops and police were deliberately harming civilians but promised all alleged atrocities would be investigated.

"We have difficulties distinguishing between GAM and civilians. We cannot [guarantee] a zero casualty rate. But it's not on purpose." Events on Saturday night at the State Islamic Institute appeared to belie this. Police said they raided university accommodation and arrested 17 separatists. A police commander, Sayed Hussain, said those held were "probably political members or from clandestine movements [linked to GAM]".

Students who said they witnessed the raid, which they said was a two-hour violent attack on the students' union and not on accommodation, said 15 people were arrested and that none of them was connected to separatists.

"Three of the students were Red Cross volunteers, five were from the environmental society, one was just an ordinary student and two were from the university regiment," said Abdillah, who was hiding in a nearby building.

"We heard the beatings and screaming so we just kept as quiet as we could." The students' version is given credibility by the fact that when the Guardian visited the students' union yesterday morning, most of the eight rooms in it had clearly just been vandalised.

Explosions rock North Aceh town as death toll mounts

Agence France Presse - May 26, 2003

A series of explosions rocked the district town of Lhokseumawe in North Aceh, as the death toll continued its climb at the end of the first week of a massive government operation to crush separatist rebels in the province.

At least five people were killed or found dead across Aceh by noon Sunday, witnesses and police said, as a delegation of five government ministers arrived to asses the situation.

A soldier was killed in a clash with rebels in North Aceh district shortly after noon Sunday, Lieutenant Colonel Yani Basuki, spokesman for the operation, said on Elshinta radio.

Indonesian police said they had arrested 12 students in a crack- down on separatist supporters during the operation. Aceh police spokesman Sayed Husainy said the 12 students at the State Institute for Religious Sciences were arrested late Saturday along with five private-sector workers. Husainy also said that non-governmental organizations "which so far have claimed to defend human rights" will be monitored.

Aceh has been under martial law since Monday as up to 40,000 police and soldiers confront what the government estimates are around 5,000 rebels from the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), which has been fighting for an independent state since 1976.

Three explosions heard behind the fishmarket in Lhokseumawe around 9:10am sparked panic in the market. Brigadier General Bambang Darmono, deputy chief of the Aceh military operations, told journalists later that the three explosions were caused by bombs dropped from airforce aircraft.

"They were sonic bombs, aimed at demoralizing the enemy, in this case, demoralizing the GAM in the Sawang and Nissam areas," Darmono said. Hundreds of residents living along the city's shoreline fled or were asked by the military to move to a local mosque at the time of the explosions.

Two alleged GAM rebels were shot dead on the eastern edge of Lhokseumawe Sunday. Bullets and a grenade lay next to their bodies on the side of the road. "We had suspected them for a long time," a soldier at the scene said. "When we stopped them, they tried to shoot." Two other bodies were found at separate locations in Aceh Besar district on Sunday, humanitarian workers there said.

Darwis Jeunib of the local GAM command said that he had seen rebels kill one soldier during an attack on a military post in the Bireun district on Saturday. "One soldier was killed, I myself saw it. We fired a rocket," Jeunib told AFP in Jakarta. The military media center could not immediately comment on the report.

Residents of Pantonlabu in North Aceh said that a grenade thrown into the local market injured 11 people, six of them seriously.

Aceh Military Spokesman Navy Colonel Ditya Sudarsono said in Banda Aceh Sunday that 66 GAM members have been killed.

Also on Sunday, two men on a motorcycle shot dead a known pro- Indonesian man while he drank coffee in Aceh Besar, police spokesman Sayed Husainy said.

Sudarsono said that 377 schools have been burned or otherwise destroyed in Aceh so far.

During his visit to Aceh on Sunday, People's Welfare Minister Yusuf Kalla said the government will make available whatever funds necessary to rebuild the burned schools.

Kalla said that foreign non-governmental organizations were barred from entering and operating in Aceh without permit, the Antara news agency said.

Food shortages add to burden in war-weary Aceh

Reuters - May 26, 2003

Dean Yates, Banda Aceh -- As the battered truck pulled up after negotiating some of Aceh's dangerous country roads, 20 traders crowded around, eager to get their supplies of tomatoes, chillis and dried crackers.

With their shelves half empty, deliveries from the fertile hinterlands of the Indonesian province of Aceh are welcome but increasingly rare as a government military offensive against Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebels moves into its second week.

"Many drivers are just too scared and fuel is more expensive," said trader Basri Jalil, adding he had been forced to hike the price of tomatoes to 12,000 rupiah ($1.40) a kg from 2,000 a week ago.

Across this sprawl of stalls behind the imposing 125-year Baiturrahman Mosque, the spiritual heart of the local capital Banda Aceh, traders and shoppers told similar stories. "People are still buying, they just don't buy as much. They have to eat," said Jalil, before hauling off his stock.

Indonesian officials have sought to reassure people, saying steps are being taken to distribute staples in war-hit Aceh, under martial law as government forces stage their biggest ever offensive against GAM since fighting broke out 27 years ago.

But the United Nations has warned of a humanitarian crisis. One local official said food prices had risen across almost all of Aceh, home to four million people, because trucks were unable to deliver supplies. He said it was also too dangerous to allow relief agencies to distribute food in the countryside.

There have been attacks on traffic and vehicles set ablaze, blamed by the military on GAM. Fear of such attacks and getting caught in the crossfire has been too much for many drivers.

The owner of one grocery store here said he feared the food shortages could become the worst since the conflict began. "No goods at all are making it. See this, it's all old," he said, pointing to flaccid vegetables hanging from the ceiling.

Chief Social Welfare Minister Yusuf Kalla said on Sunday that trucks carrying food supplies would be protected. He also said the government would charter ships that could hold up to 60 trucks at a time to drop supplies to Banda Aceh and the city of Lhokseumawe, near some of the heaviest fighting.

Traders and residents said the worst shortages in Banda Aceh, 1,700 km northwest of Jakarta, were of vegetables, cooking oil, milk powder and cigarettes. But, crucially, they said rice supplies had not been hit.

Aceh's war has often brought the economy to a standstill and badly hit farming in one of Indonesia's most fertile places. But finding supplies is not the only problem. There are also Indonesian soldiers, long accused of operating with impunity in the resource-rich province, to deal with.

One fruit seller said three times in the past two weeks troops had dropped by asking for mangoes and apples and refused to pay. "I want to close my stall but I have debts," he said, begging that neither his name nor the stall's location be disclosed.

Amnesty reports serious abuses in Aceh

Sydney Morning Herald - May 26 , 2003

Grave human rights abuses including the killing of children and other civilians are already being reported in Indonesia's Aceh province, Amnesty International says.

A major military offensive aimed at crushing the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) entered its second week today in the province, which has been placed under martial law.

Amnesty, in a weekend report, urged both sides to make protection of civilians a priority and said it is gravely concerned that martial law will make abuses more likely.

"There are already reports that this is the case and that civilians, including children, have been subjected to extrajudicial execution, and that many thousands of people have been forced to flee their homes..." the report said. "Amnesty International reminds the government of Indonesia that the declaration of a military emergency does not allow derogation of basic human rights..."

The London-based group said Jakarta must follow several steps "if the massive human rights violations which have characterised previous operations are not to be repeated." Amnesty welcomed statements by various officials that civilian casualties would be avoided and rights respected but urged the government to make an official public statement to this effect.

In a reference to Major General Adam Damiri, it expressed "particular concern" that a senior officer on trial in Jakarta for crimes against humanity in East Timor in 1999 has a direct role in Aceh military operations.

It also took issue with army chief General Ryamizard Ryacudu, who recently described as "heroes" seven soldiers who were convicted of murdering pro-independence leader Theys Eluay in Papua.

Amnesty said the government must "issue clear and strongly worded directives" to security forces to stick to international human rights and humanitarian law. Guilty parties must be prosecuted.

"Despite the thousands of cases of human rights violations that have been reported in [Aceh] over the years, in only three cases known to Amnesty International have investigations been completed and members of the security forces been brought to trial," it said.

Even before martial law, it said, "torture of detainees in both police and military custody was widespread as were deaths in custody and 'disappearances' of suspects." In Aceh and elsewhere in Indonesia in the past, Amnesty said, security forces have tortured or raped women and girls as a form of intimidation and as punishment for their, or their relatives', alleged involvement with opposition groups.

Since 2000, the rights group said, 13 human rights defenders are believed to have been executed in Aceh and scores of others subjected to torture, detention without charge and harassment and intimidation.

Amnesty also said there have been credible reports of unlawful killings, abductions and torture by GAM members both against members of the security forces and civilians. The rebels had also recruited child fighters, it said, calling on rebel commanders publicly to declare their opposition to rights abuses by its members.

TNI's youth wing PPM protests Kontras

Jakarta Post - May 26, 2003

Jakarta -- Dozens of members of Pemuda Panca Marga (PPM), a youth organization which is supervised by the Indonesian Military (TNI) staged on Monday a rally in front of the office of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) on Jl. Cisadane, Central Jakarta.

PPM criticized Kontras' human rights monitoring activities in the war-torn province of Aceh, saying that the non-governmental organization showed no nationalism. Elshinta reported.

The youths almost clashed with a Kontras' activist when they torn down and burnt a banner which stated 'Reject Antiterrorism Bill". The activist managed to grab the banner and run into the office when the youths chased and tried to mob him.

Kontras, which was founded during dictator President Soeharto's era, is known for its firm stance against militarism.

PRD: TNI does do not want to be controlled by NGOs

Detik.com - May 26, 2003

Luhur Hertanto, Jakarta -- The People's Democratic Party has responded cynically to the plans to prohibit non-government organisations from entering Aceh because this obviously shows that the government does not want to be control by parties outside of the armed forces (TNI).

"We are concerned that there is no control from outside parties and the real possibly that human rights violations against civilians will occur during the application of marshal law".

This was conveyed by the Presidium Secretary (sic) of the PRD, Yusuf Nakkeseng [Lakeseng (correct spelling) is the head of the PRD's military affairs section -- JB] to Detik.com at the offices of the Human Rights Commission on Jl Latuharhari in Central Jakarta on Monday.

The People's Consultative Assembly has formed an Aceh desk and the TNI has formed a monitoring [team]. "Obviously because this monitoring team will be conducted by the government, it may occur they will sanitize the facts regarding human rights violations and will justify all violent actions against civilians", said Yusuf.

[Translated by James Balowski.]

How Jakarta sabotaged Aceh peace talks

Radio Netherlands - May 18, 2003

[The following is a translation of an interview in Tokyo with Erwanto, a representative Aceh People's Freedom Front (FPDRA).]

The talks between RI and GAM in Tokyo could have succeeded. As a representative of civil society, Erwanti attended the talks between the two sides in Tokyo on 17 and 18 May, the day before martial law was proclaimed in Aceh.

Erwanto: There was a lengthy debate about GAM's active participation in the 2004 elections, followed by an explicit declaration of acceptance of special autonomy. We said that the freedom struggle was not just a GAM struggle but was a struggle of civil society in Aceh. Because we see this as the final objective. Of course our reference is somewhat different from GAM's, and we explained this to the US ambassador (Ralph Boyce) and Martin Griffith of the HDC. A long discussion then followed with some amendments offered by Ambassador Boyce to the effect that GAM should abandon its armed struggle and follow the same perspective. That they would lay down their arms and conduct a political struggle.

RN: So did GAM say they were ready to lay down their arms?

Erwanto: That's right. They said explicitly that they would change the orientation of their struggle from an armed struggle to giving priority to a political movement. At this point, the talks were proceeding well. We felt that they would succeed because there has been concessions from both sides. Then we had to wait while the Indonesian team held a meeting, which took about five hours because they needed to coordinate their position with Jakarta. After waiting for five hours, we along with the GAM delegates consisting of five persons were invited to attend a plenary session, attended by all the participants, minus the Indonesian team. Those present were from the World Bank, the European Union and the donor countries. When this meeting convened, Martin looked very disappointed indeed and said that the final answer had been received from Jakarta. This final draft was very different from their earlier draft and it was very firm.

RN: What differences emerged after they spoke by phone to Jakarta?

Erwanto: It was very rough and very undiplomatic. I myself coming from civil society simply could not accept it.

RN: What did it say?

Erwanto: They have to accept special autonomy and agree to remain within the Unitary Republic of Indonesi. The TNA (GAM's armed force) would have to be disbanded and another point was that all their arms would have to be surrendered. To me, this was very unproductive. The disbandment of the TNA had not been mentioned in the first draft. The Indonesian side had made their position much firmer. We, representing 54 organisations in Aceh, made our point to the GAM team. Our first point was that the purpose of the Joint Security Council should be to strengthen COHA (cessation of hostilities accord) with no further options added. The COHA formulation was already fine and the two sides should focus their energies on the successful achievement of COHA operations in the field. But things were very different after the Indonesian team had consulted with Jakarta. It was very roughly put and showed no respect for their negotiating partners. We had accepted the offer, accommodated it.

RN: Accommodated what?

Erwanto: That GAM would be involved in the 2004 elections but that the offer of autonomy should not be made explicit. That was the essence of the struggle. Then after the Indonesian team consulted with Jakarta, the meeting we had lasted only five minutes. Martin from the HDC had received the final draft from Jakarta.

RN: So Martin had the final draft from Jakarta. What did Martin say?

Erwanto: It was all very rude. After Malik Mahmood read the draft, he immediately rejected it. It took him only five minutes to read it and reject it. After reading it and almost without any consultations with others in his team he said that, with a heavy heart, GAM was unable to accept the draft. And Martin said that what had happened was something that no one had expected to happen.

RN: So what was the point that led to the breakdown in Tokyo? What was the breaking-point?

Erwanto: According to me, Indonesia no longer had any patience to negotiate. They would use this meeting of the Joint Security Council to quit COHA because it would be more respectful to quit the accord at a meeting of the Joint Security Council. And the Indonesian side offered a most extreme option that could not possibly be accepted by GAM. And this provided the political legitimation for Indonesia to quit COHA.

West Papua

Rampage claimed in West Papua

Courier Mail (Australia) -- May 31, 2003

Jayapura -- Indonesian military using flame throwers are burning houses, killing people and destroying livestock and gardens in the Kurawage district in West Papua, according to the human rights group Elsham.

Fifteen Papuans had been killed and several hundred others who fled into the forest were now starving, group spokesmen said yesterday.

Two pastors who returned at night last week seeking food for their people were shot, they said. They were Kutis Tabuli, 41 and Engellek Tabuli, 57, who was the district church leader.

Eleven churches had been destroyed and many Papuans were still missing, Elsham said. According to reports, some victims died inside their houses when flamethrowers were used.

Elsham said that when a bible was located, the army would burn it deliberately to show disapproval and more than 50 such burnings had occurred. The military campaign started on April 4 when some weapons were stolen from an army depot at Wamena barracks.

Local sources claim this incident was organised by Kopassus special forces but carried out by a dozen Papuan members of a pro-Jakarta militia. Nine soldiers have already been arrested for their involvement in the theft. During the break-in, two off-duty soldiers were killed but Kopassus has denied responsibility for the bungled burglary.

In retaliation, a large-scale operation was launched using more than a thousand additional troops and Brimob, the mobile police counter insurgence unit.

Indonesia is fighting separatist rebels in West Papua. It faces local opposition over plans to split the area into three provinces.

US warns Indonesia over American deaths, Aceh

Reuters - May 30, 2003

Singapore -- The United States said on Friday it had warned Indonesia "at the highest levels" that a failure by Jakarta to cooperate in solving the murder of two American teachers would seriously affect bilateral ties.

Speaking with Indonesian Defence Minister Matori Abdul Djalil at his side, US Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz also pressed Jakarta to ensure transparency in its military offensive in Aceh province and said independent monitoring should be allowed.

The unusually blunt message was expected to carry particular weight because it was delivered in public by Wolfowitz, a former US ambassador to Indonesia who maintains close ties to the country. The news conference followed talks between Matori and Wolfowitz on the sidelines of a security conference in Singapore.

The fiscal 2004 US budget includes $400,000 for the International Military Education and Training programme to bring Indonesian military officers to the United States. But the Senate Foreign Relations Committee recently voted to place conditions on both IMET and a programme for financing foreign purchases of US military goods.

The committee wanted President George W. Bush's assurance that Indonesia's armed forces were taking "effective measures" to probe the August 31, 2002, attack on the two US citizens and to prosecute those responsible. Wolfowitz said the killing of the two teachers in an ambush last August at a US-run mine in far eastern Papua province was an important issue.

'Need satisfactory cooperation'

"We made it clear at the highest levels in Indonesia we need satisfactory cooperation with Indonesia or it will affect the whole relationship," he said.

FBI agents joined an Indonesian team earlier this year to investigate but no one has been charged over the killings and no details of the FBI's findings have been made public.

The Pentagon has been eager to resume IMET cooperation with Indonesia's military, which has joined the US war on terror. Wolfowitz voiced reluctance to use the programme to put pressure on Indonesia in this instance.

He and other top Pentagon officials believe IMET, by exposing Indonesian officers to the US system, is an effective way to promote military reform.

Wolfowitz also called for a political solution to the struggle by rebels in Aceh for independence for the oil and gas-rich province, a demand rejected by Jakarta.

The Indonesian defence minister told reporters the campaign in Aceh would be short, "not more than six months". "We understand that too long a measure is not good for our government," he said.

Stop forest exploitation: Papuans

Jakarta Post - May 28, 2003

Jakarta -- Papuan tribal leaders and students from Greater Jakarta urged the government on Tuesday to revoke forest concessions given to dozens of companies that have failed to preserve the environment. They argued that a lack of government control has caused illegal logging and forest fires to increase in the country's easternmost province.

They voiced their demands during a peaceful rally at the lobby of the House of Representatives (DPR) on Tuesday. The protesters specifically demanded that Forestry Minister M. Prakosa investigate logging activities by 12 subsidiaries of Djajanti Group and PT Artika Optima Inti in Nabire. They also demanded that the provincial and regent administrations be given more authority to manage forestry activities in the province to ensure that local people benefited from their forests.

Some non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have alleged, however, that illegal logging has increased in the province since the province was granted the status of special autonomy in 2001, as local administrations have hurried to raise revenue.

HIV/AIDS cases in Papua reach alarming level

Jakarta Post - May 27, 2003

Nethy Dharma Somba, Jayapura -- Compared to Papua province's population of 2.1 million, the prevalence of HIV/AIDS cases in the province has reached an alarming level with a total of 1,263 people with HIV, including 539 who have contracted the fatal disease.

Chairman of the Commission for Handling of AIDS (KPA) in the province, Constan Karma, expressed his deep concern over the HIV/AIDS cases in the province that almost constitutes 50 percent of the national figure. "The number of HIV/AIDS cases nationwide is 3,782, with 1,263 cases in Papua," he said here on Monday. He said the HIV/AIDS cases was an iceberg phenomenon, indicating that "we will likely find one case among 100 people, and if no action is taken, we fear the number of people with HIV/AIDS will reach 126,000 in the next decade."

Constan, also the province's deputy governor, said that the HIV prevalence is alarming because there are 24.13 HIV/AIDS cases for every 100,000 people. "At the national level, only 0.6 cases are found for every 100,000 people," he said, citing the country's population at 206.2 million. Of the 1,263 cases, 527 are found in Merauke regency, 308 in Timika regency and 149 in Sorong regency.

Constan said the virus was transferred via unprotected sex, and those with HIV/AIDS were between the ages of 20 and 39. Local health officer Bagus Sukaswara said the fatal disease, which was detected for the first time ten years ago in Merauke, has claimed 350 lives, averaging 35 deaths annually. He said the disease was first brought to the province by Thai fishermen and spread through sex workers easily found in coastal transmigrant resettlement areas in Merauke.

KPA Chairman Farid W. Hussain blamed the sexual behavior among adults and sharing needles among drug abusers on the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS in the country. Besides launching a safe sex campaign, the government should strictly enforce the law to minimize the spread of HIV/AIDS, he said.

Family Health International Director Steven Wignall called on the Indonesian people to avoid casual unprotected sex and to use condoms when having sex with different partners. Constan also called upon religious and tribal leaders to persuade locals to avoid casual sex to minimize the number of HIV/AIDS cases in the future. "In addition, the government is preparing a bylaw requiring the use of condoms in red-light districts in the province," he said.

At the end of March, there were 2,556 cases of HIV and 1,086 cases of AIDS in Indonesia. However, the figures might not be a true indication of the actual amount of patients as many cases go unreported. Some estimates suggest that there were 90,000 to 130,000 people who are HIV-positive in 2002.

The director general of Communicable Disease Control, Haikin Rachmat, said recently that new infections had almost doubled over the past two years. Unprotected sex accounts for 73 percent of all cases of HIV in Indonesia, followed by sharing needles at 24 percent.

The latest report on the AIDS epidemic from the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) said injecting drugs was a growing phenomenon in urban areas in Indonesia because of recent social and economic upheavals.

Three Papua villagers in hiding die of starvation

Jakarta Post - May 28, 2003

Nethy Dharma Somba, Jayapura -- Three residents of Kuyawage village in the Papua regency of Wamena have reportedly starved to death after fleeing their homes to avoid a sweep by the Army for those responsible for last month's raid on the arsenal of the Wamena military compound. The identities of the three people were not immediately available.

The chairman of the regional office of the Indonesian Communion of Churches (PGI), Rev. Socrates Sofyan, told The Jakarta Post here on Tuesday that the three villagers, also members of the PGI, starved to death in the forest in which they had taken refuge. He said all of the residents of Kuyawage village fled to the forest when the Army deployed hundreds of soldiers to search for those responsible for stealing rifles and ammunition from the military arsenal.

The villagers were fearful because in the past the military has accused them of supporting the Free Papua Movement (OPM), he said. "So far three villagers have died and if this situation continues more and more villagers will also die," he said.

He said he and other church ministers could do nothing to help the villagers because the village and the surrounding forest were isolated and outsiders were not being allowed into the area.

The Army has deployed 140 soldiers from its Special Forces (Kopassus) and Strategic Reserves Command (Kostrad) to help in the hunt for the rebels though to be responsible for the killing of two soldiers and the theft of 29 rifles and guns and thousands of rounds of ammunition.

Twenty-two of the rifles and guns have been recovered and a number of people, including three soldiers, are being held as suspects in the raid.

Socrates called on the military to call off its operation and allow the villagers to return to their homes. Local religious leaders also have expressed concern over the military operation, which they say could result in civilian deaths.

Iwan K. Nidoen, a member of a coalition of local non-governmental organizations (NGOs) carrying out its own investigation into the arsenal raid, said the military was targeting several villages suspected of supporting separatist rebels.

"Many villagers have been living in fear since the military swept through their villages looking for rebels. Many youths have been beaten, their houses ransacked and their belongings stolen," said Frederika, another member of the coalition.

Both Socrates and the coalition of NGOs called on the military to halt the operation and establish an independent team to investigate the arsenal raid. Maj. G.T. Situmorang, spokesman for the Trikora Military Command overseeing Papua, declined to comment on the reports of the three civilian deaths.

All he would say was that Trikora Military Command chief Maj. Gen. Nurdin Zainal had been informed that the villagers had fled into the forest not because of the military operation but because they were afraid of the rebels. "The villages were abandoned before the military operation was launched. The villagers went into hiding in the forest because of the rebels," he said.

He said that the local military would continue with its operation until all of the remaining rifles and rounds of ammunition had been recovered, adding that "we have called on the villagers to return to their homes and resume their daily lives if they were not involved in the raid".

Meanwhile, Jayawijaya military district chief Col. Agus Mulyadi told the Post by telephone on Tuesday that soldiers shot and killed a rebel, identified as Kabelek Hiluka, inside a house in Ibele village, 10 kilometers south of Wamena, at 4:30 p.m. "The victim was shot for resisting arrest and trying to escape," he said, adding that 13 other people who were hiding in the house were detained, while another person, Harun Sikopere, escaped with a rifle.

Of the 13 people, 12 were released after being questioned while another man, Linus Siluka, admitted to being a member of the OPM and was detained for further investigation.

Rural issues

Lampung farmers need protection

Jakarta Post - May 26, 2003

Oyos Saroso H.N., Bandar Lampung -- With no protection from the government, farmers in Lampung are having a difficult time surviving a time of economic hardship. Over the last few years, thousands of farmers have cut down their coffee plants to grow rice because of falling coffee prices both at home and abroad. The farmers now have to deal with the falling price of unhusked rice during the current harvest.

The local office of the State Logistics Agency (Bulog) has set the price of unhusked rice at Rp 1,200 (14 US cents) per kilogram, but in reality the price has dropped to between Rp 700 and Rp 900 per kilogram.

Both Bulog's local office and the local agricultural office have declined to take responsibility for the falling prices, instead blaming the farmers for failing to hold their harvested rice to avoid flooding the market.

Tugiran, 45, a resident of Gunungsugih village in Central Lampung, said he was losing money on his paddy, which he cut down his coffee plants to grow.

"I invested Rp 2.5 million per hectare but I'm only making Rp 3 million per hectare. We are suffering losses because a profit of Rp 500,000 per hectare is not worth the energy and the three months my family and I spent growing the paddy," he said. He said he sold his unhusked rice at between Rp 700 and Rp 800 per kilogram.

Sunarto, a resident of Seputihrman village in Central Lampung, criticized the local administration for not protecting farmers in the regency. Production costs have risen to Rp 2.5 million per hectare from Rp 1.5 million because of the rising cost of anti- pest chemicals and fertilizers.

Farmers in East Lampung and Tulang Bawang are having a more difficult time than those in other regencies, because many paddy fields in the regencies were damaged by flooding in January and February and the farmers took out bank loans to purchase chemicals and fertilizers for their fields. "Many farmers failed to harvest their crops which were damaged by floods during the rainy season," said Romlani, a resident of Tumijajar village in Tulang Bawanng regency.

Ramli, a farmer in Trimurjo village in Central Lampung, said all of the farmers in the regency were upset because they did not see any concrete action on the part of the local authorities to control the falling price of rice.

According to investigations by The Jakarta Post, the fall in the price of unhusked rice has to do with both overproduction and middlemen who have formed a syndicate to monopolize the price of the commodity. Part of Bulog's responsibility is to protect prices and monitor middlemen it has appointed to purchase rice directly from farmers.

However, the chief of the Food Resiliency Agency's local office, Joko Umarsaid, called on farmers to hold back some of their harvests to avoid flooding the market, which would force prices down even further.

"Farmers should hold back between 20 percent and 50 percent of their harvest to avoid any further falls in the price of paddy during the next harvest season," he said, adding that the local administration had disbursed Rp 5.7 billion to village cooperatives to help stabilize rice prices.

The chief of the local Bulog office, Saldi Supardji, said Bulog had purchased 76,000 tons of unhusked rice from farmers, and its ultimate target was to purchase 125,000 tons, or 5 percent, of the province's total rice production. He added that he had appointed a team to look into the falling prices.

Asrian Hendicaya, an economist at Lampung University, called on Bulog to play a larger role in stabilizing rice prices in the local market. "Bulog should be able to play a double role as a supplier during the harvest season and as a distributor during the off season, in an effort to maintain the balance between demand and supply during all seasons," he said.

Sugarcane farmers threaten boycott

Jakarta Post - May 26, 2003

Nana Rukmana, Cirebon -- Thousands of sugar cane farmers in the West Java regency of Cirebon threatened to boycott the supply of sugar cane to sugar producers unless the government raised the price of sugar cane, said the chairman of the local sugar cane farmers' association.

Chairman of the Cirebon branch of the Association of Sugarcane Farmers (APTRI) Anwar Asmaili said that farmers demanded sugar mills purchase their sugar cane for at least Rp 3,500 (about 41 US cents) per kilogram. The minimum price for sugar cane is set by the government, which has recently proposed increasing it by Rp 150 to Rp 3,250.

"If the demand is not met by the government, they [sugar cane farmers] will not release their sugar cane into the market until the government pays the price differential," Anwar said on Saturday.

He said the threat had come from 35,000 Cirebon sugar cane farmers, who supply sugar for markets along West Java's north coast and southern parts. Without an agreement with the government, he said, the farmers would retain their sugar cane harvest for this year.

Currently, sugar mills throughout the province purchase farmers' sugar cane at a minimum of Rp 3,100 per kilogram. Anwar said that even with an increase of Rp 150 per kilogram, many farmers would still operate at a loss. He said only sugar came farmers with a high productivity could survive on the revised minimum price.

Farmers also agreed on a 20 percent share for the government if the price of sugar cane in the market exceeded the minimum price of Rp 3,500, he added.

The government has had difficulties regulating the sugar industry, facing protests at low sugar cane prices from farmers on one hand, and steep prices for sugar consumers on the other.

Last year an influx of imported sugar put a strain on farmers who suffered from a fall in sugar prices.

A new policy restricting sugar importers to four state-owned companies, from 800 private importers previously, had only led to a surge in sugar prices among consumers, but not, however, for sugar farmers.

Government officials have blamed the industry's distribution channels for the price disparity. Analysts said that it showed rent-seeking was widespread in the sugar industry.

Anwar said that the West Java administration had offered Rp 5 billion in bailout funds when sugar prices plunged amid the influx of imported sugar last year. This year, he said, the administration had Rp 17 billion to bail out farmers should prices plunge again. So far, he added, none of the money had been disbursed.

'War on terrorism'

Indonesian terror group held top planning meet: newspaper

Agence France Presse - May 30, 2003

An Indonesian group linked to the al-Qaeda network held a high- level meeting last month in Indonesia, possibly to identify new terrorist targets, The Australian newspaper reported.

Citing unidentified intelligence sources, the newspaper Friday said the meeting involved members of four cells of Jemaah Islamiyah, a radical Islamic group blamed for killing 202 people in a car bombing last October.

The meeting included a former resident of Australia, Abdul Rahim Ayub, who reportedly heads a Jemaah Islamiyah cell responsible for actions in Australia, the newspaper said.

Prime Minister John Howard said he was aware of reports on the meeting, but could not confirm them. "There are reports of it, yes. I think I'd say I can't confirm or deny it," he said on commercial radio. "But what I can say, very definitely, is that we don't have any additional information indicating a specific new threat to Australia," he said.

Ayub left Australia soon after the October 12 bombing on the Indonesian resort island of Bali that killed 88 Australians. His wife and children followed soon afterwards and are believed to be living in Indonesia.

Australia has been on a high terrorism alert since the Bali bombing and due to threats by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network to attack the country.

Bali suspects name Bashir as JI head

Melbourne Age - May 29, 2003

Matthew Moore, Jakarta -- Two key suspects in the Bali bombings testified yesterday that Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir is the head of Jemaah Islamiah, the al-Qaeda linked terror organisation blamed for the attacks.

On trial for treason, Bashir, a frail old man man in little white socks, flatly denied the claim to the Jakarta District Court. Bashir sat impassively with his defence team as the alleged bombers recounted their relationships with him and explained their understanding of JI.

Ali Imron said he first met Bashir at his Islamic boarding school in Ngruki when he visited with his father in the 1980s. Back then Bashir's friend Abdullah Sungkar was head of JI, Ali Imron said, but when he died in 1999, Bashir took over the top position.

Pressed on whether he knew as fact Bashir was head of JI, or whether it was simply his belief, Ali Imron said "in my opinion there's no distinction". Imron also admitted involvement in the Christmas Eve 2000 bombing of a church on Batam Island, near Singapore, but said he did not know whether Bashir ordered that attack.

While Ali Imron said he had not taken part in a ceremony to join JI, a second Bali suspect, Mubarok, said he had joined the organisation by swearing an oath to a man called Zulkarnaen five years ago. "Zulkarnaen asked me if I am ready to obey the leader as long as the leader does not bring me to sinful ways," he told the court.

Zulkarnaen had later told him Bashir was the new leader of JI, a claim Bashir again denied: "I deny his conclusion that I am the emir of JI. I also deny that I have links with Zulkarnaen." The man believed to be the overall organiser of the Bali bombings, Ali Ghufron, told the court he knew Osama bin Laden well but denied he had had any role in the bombing.

He said he had known Bashir in Malaysia when they used to pray together in a mosque, but Bashir denied they'd ever met.

"I don't know him," he said. "His story about Malaysia is also not true." Five judges, half a dozen prosecutors and a bank of 30 defence lawyers quizzed the Bali suspects who had been flown from Bali to Jakarta in an attempt by prosecutors to prove Bashir was the head of JI, an organisation banned because of terrorist activities.

Prosecutors allege Bashir planned a wave of Christmas bombings in 2000 and conspired to assassinate the then Indonesian vice- president, Megawati Soekarnoputri.

Ali Ghufron and the other witnesses however denied they'd sought Bashir's blessing for the Christmas bombings or the Bali bombings. "I know that Bashir as an old man would not agree with the bombings, I have never heard his sermons suggesting violence," he said.

While heavily armed police stood guard outside the court, hundreds of heavily partisan supporters inside cheered each new witness with roaring calls of "Allahu Akbar" (God is Great).

Government & politics

PKB names Gus Dur presidential candidate

Jakarta Post - May 31, 2003

A'an Suryana, Jakarta -- The National Awakening Party (PKB) concluded its three-day national meeting late on Thursday by naming its chief patron, Abdurrahman Wahid, its presidential candidate.

However, it is too early to say whether Abdurrahman, better known as Gus Dur, is supported by the whole party, as PKB is also prepared to pick other presidential candidates from inside or outside the party.

Muhammad A.S. Hikam, head of the meeting's steering committee and PKB deputy chairman, said several alternative figures had been mentioned during the meeting. "Other names will be made public by the PKB executive board, but it depends on how things develop," Hikam told reporters after the closing ceremony of the national meeting.

A number of provincial chapters had touted Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) chairman Hasyim Muzadi and Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono as presidential aspirants.

Hasyim's nomination was proposed by NU clerics who claimed to represent 30 provincial chapters of the country's largest Muslim organization.

Hikam refused to reveal the reason why the alternative candidates had not been announced, but sources said the decision was a compromise to appease potential conflict between Gus Dur and his opponents. However, Hasyim later played down the support, saying he would only accept his nomination for the presidency if he was supported by both the PKB and the executive board of the NU.

Gus Dur's presidential bid is facing a serious challenge as the presidential election bill currently being deliberated at the House of Representatives requires candidates to be of sound mind and body. Gus Dur has impaired eyesight following two minor strokes in the past.

The presidential elections bill is expected to be passed approximately in June this year. If the House passes the health requirement, then Gus Dur's candidacy would be jeopardized. If this occurs, PKB will likely name others as its presidential candidates.

The PKB national meeting also asserted that any executive and legislative candidates in the 2004 general election must have the consent of NU ulemas.

Meanwhile, the executive board of the PKB announced a plan to appeal a court decision that ruled unlawful the 2001 dismissal of Matori Abdul Djalil by Gus Dur as PKB chairman last year.

Matori was fired after he attended the Special Session of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) in 2001, which led to Gus Dur's removal as president. According to the judges, Matori's presence was acceptable as he was also an MPR deputy speaker at that time.

Alwi was named Matori's replacement and made the party's leader later that year. Matori also founded his own PKB, sparking a legal dispute between him and Gus Dur loyalists. PKB under Matori sprang a surprise by naming Gus Dur its presidential candidate, which Gus Dur immediately turned down.

New law paves way for more women in parliament

Radio Australia - May 26, 2003

Women's groups in Indonesia have welcomed a new law that paves the way for more women to enter parliament.

There are currently only 45 women among Indonesia's 462 MPs -- even though over fifty percent of Indonesia's population is female. The electoral bill passed earlier this week sets a quota for political parties to have at least thirty percent women candidates on their electoral lists. But, while supporters are celebrating, the law does not carry as much weight as many would like.

Transcript:

Mascall: Indonesian women activists are caling it a breakthrough. At last they've got the portal into politics so many of them have fought for. The way is set for thirty percent female candidates on party lists for election next year in 2004. A far cry from the last elections in 1999 -- says Dr Chusnul Mariyah from the Electoral Commission -- back then Aceh and Bali were regions where not a single woman was elected.

Mariyah: We used to have a glass ceiling, you know, for women even to be candidates. Because you know our experience in 1999 in some places zero percent of the candidates were women. So this is like open door. You know like building more fair playing field for women to enter politics through political parties. To go into the election, to be a candidate so this is like one step to get more achievement for women to be part of the decision making process in this country.

Mascall: But not everyone is celebrating the new law. Of the nine factions in the national assembly four did not support the quota clause. Prominent resistence came from the PDIP -- the party of female Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri. PDIP deputy chairperson Dr Mochtar Buchori acknowledges a number of his party colleagues campaigned against the law.

Buchori: I do not belong to that group. I welcome this new legislation. The party has never been united in any case in any important issue. But that is democracy. There are those who oppose the introduction of new ideas but there are also those who support those new ideas. I belong to the group that support new ideas in the legislation and the political life.

Mascall: But the fact that members of the PDIP were opposed to women candidate quotas exposes a weakness in the new legislation. Scrutiny of the wording reveals that the obligation on parties to adopt the thirty percent quota is purely a moral one. If parties choose to ignore it, there is nothing legally to stop them. Dr Mariyah is calling for sanctions to be added to the law to penalise political parties refusing to comply.

Mariyah: There is no sanction that is a weakness.

Mascall: What kind of sanction would you like to see?

Mariyah: I think we have to say like that you have to deliver or not to be a contestant is one of the requirements.

Mascall: So thirty percent women on the list of candidates, or you're not allowed to stand for election.

Mariyah: Yes, yes and I would really like to see that but the problem is democracy is a process.

Mascall: Dr Mariyah acknowledges that democratic process could take some time. The current legislation is aimed at 2004 but tougher enforcement of the quotas may not be fortrhcoming, she says until 2009. Nevertheless, the current legislation is seen as a step forward. M.R.S. Hikam, the chairman of the PKB National Awakening Party says his party supports a move that he regards as only a first step.

Hikam: Sometime we are not able to get everything we want, you know. We actually would like to have that this regulation should be seen as mandatory to all political parties but we could not have that. But at least, you know, now in Indonesia we have legislation that try to recommend that the thirty percent quota is very important for the justice.

Human rights/law

No decisive action to curb rights violations: Amnesty

Agence France Presse - May 28, 2003

London -- Indonesia failed to take decisive action to end human rights violations last year, Amnesty International said Wednesday. The London-based rights watchdog, in its report on 2002, said the country showed "little progress" in its attempts to tackle impunity in human rights cases. It also said there was an increase in the use of repressive legislation to arrest and imprison prisoners of conscience.

Amnesty said the rights situation in Aceh and Papua, the scenes of armed separatist revelts, "remained grave." In Aceh it accused both the military and the rebel Free Aceh Movement of serious violations. "Efforts to find a peaceful solution to political and other grievances in Papua continued to be undermined by human rights violations by the security forces," Amnesty said.

It said human rights defenders in both provinces continued to be subjected to abuses including extrajudicial executions, torture and unlawful arrests as well as threats and harassment.

In general, it said, "attempts to tackle impunity in human rights cases made little progress as political resistance and legal and institutional weaknesses continued to undermine investigations and trials of those suspected of human rights violations."

Amnesty criticised proceedings at a human rights court set up to try suspects in the 1999 violence in East Timor. The court has so far acquitted 12 of the defendants and jailed five others, who remain free pending appeal. Another is awaiting a verdict.

Amnesty also reported an increase in the arrest and imprisonment of "prisoners of conscience" based on what it called repressive legislation concerning insults to the head of state.

Focus on Jakarta

Poor targeted in massive registration crackdown

Jakarta Post - May 31, 2003

Tertiani ZB Simanjuntak, Jakarta -- People living in Jakarta will be jailed for up to three months without trial and fined during a massive city administration crackdown on illegal residents starting June 12.

The poorest 64 subdistricts will be targeted. The City Public Order and police operation, on top of the red alert security status in the city due to the war in Aceh, also aims to establish a population database, including the taking of fingerprints.

"Collecting fingerprints is stipulated in a 1996 bylaw and also is part of a police program to have a database on Jakarta residents," Population and Civil Registration Agency head Silviana Murni told reporters on Wednesday.

She was speaking after briefing her subordinates to inform the public to get their documents arranged before June 12 and not to leave home without identity cards or other residential documents.

Those who could not produce Jakarta identity cards, neighborhood community registration documents and registration documents from their hometowns would heavy penalties. Bylaws stipulate punishment of three months in jail and a Rp 5 million (US$602) fine for undocumented residents. Residents must carry the documentation at all times. Receipt of a lodged application was sufficient.

Silviana said the operation was not related to fears of terrorist attacks by the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), but could not say why the operation had not been undertaken previously.

"In the future, the city administration would make a database on Jakartans' fingerprints ... the fingerprints would be taken, perhaps, during the making or renewal of their identity cards."

Following the imposition of martial law in war-torn Aceh, the city administration and the police have warned Jakartans of possible terrorist attacks. Sutiyoso has ordered police, in cooperation with the military, to hunt down alleged GAM members here.

Silviana said the target of the operation was the area where there were many seasonal residents and migrants, including home industry zones, factories, houses rented to non-residents and apartments in 64 of the city's 267 subdistricts.

The Population and Civil Registration Agency recorded that as of March, the number of migrants who had applied for Jakarta residency permits had reached 4,862 people. Most of the applicants were from West Java (1,518), from Central Java and Yogyakarta (934), Banten (498), East Java (355), North Sumatra (326), West Sumatra (215), and Aceh (46).

Illegal fees squeeze bus drivers

Jakarta Post - May 29, 2003

Bambang Nurbianto, Jakarta -- Public bus drivers are forced to pay, on average, up to Rp 40,000 for legal and illegal fees each day, a factor that has caused their services and safety to worsen, a survey reveals.

The survey, which was conducted by the Public Interest Research and Advocacy Center (Pirac), a non-governmental organization dealing with public interests, shows that 65 percent of drivers of medium and large city buses in Jakarta must dole out between Rp 5,000 and Rp 20,000 per day for legal fees, while 62 percent of them paid a similar amount to "certain groups" in illegal fees as well.

"Too many legal and illegal fees which must be paid by the drivers have badly affected the city bus services, causing frequent complaints from the public," say Pirac's executive As'ad Nugroho at a seminar to announce the survey results on Wednesday.

The survey further demonstrated that the woeful quality of the transportation services could be seen, among others, from the behavior of drivers on the streets, the deteriorating buses, the condition of tires and other crucial parts that have not been replaced or maintained on the buses.

As an example, the ideal for city buses is less than seven-years-old, but from the survey it was seen that 85 percent of the city buses have been in service for more than seven years. Some have even been operating since the 1970s.

The survey also shows that many bus operators have to cannibalize parts because they cannot afford to buy new ones.

The survey was conducted at seven bus terminals -- Grogol and Kota in Central Jakarta; Tanjung Priok in North Jakarta; Ragunan and Manggarai in South Jakarta, Klender and Kampung Melayu in East Jakarta -- and involved 150 drivers from 11 companies: Metromini, Kopaja, PPD, Mayasari, Steady Safe, AJ. A Putra, Himpurna, Jasa Utama, Agung Baru, Dian Mitra and Kopami Jaya.

Nugroho said that the supposedly legal fees paid by the drivers were too high, as the existing regulation says the fee should be only Rp 150 for large buses and Rp 100 for medium size buses per trip to the bus terminals. Every bus enters the terminals, on average, 10 times a day.

"If a bus enters a terminal 10 times a day, a driver should pay only Rp 1,500 for big buses and Rp 1,000 for the others. But in practice they are made to pay 5 to 20 times that," he said.

Environment

Poaching of rare species plagues national park

Jakarta Post - May 29, 2003

Jakarta -- Flora & Fauna International (FFI) and the Team for the Conservation of Sumatran Tigers (TPHS) have received reports on the unchecked poaching of Sumatran elephants and other protected species in Kerinci Seblat National Park (TNKS) in Jambi.

According to the reports, local people have recovered four dead elephants with their tusks missing in several areas of the park in the regencies of Merangin and Kerinci.

Deborah J. Martyr, a researcher with FFI's Indonesia program who accompanied the TPHS on a patrol through the national park in March, said the TPHS along with several FFI researchers received many reports from locals that a group of poachers had been hunting numerous protected species in the park for months.

While patrolling elephant habitats in Gunung Nilo, Ulu Sipurak, Ulu Sula, Air Sumpen and Muara Imat, the team recovered the carcass of an elephant in Ulu Sipurak. It was suspected the protected animal was killed in February.

Local people informed the team that the elephant was shot and killed by a group of poachers who came in through the northern part of the park in Kerinci regency. Deborah said that while on patrol, they also heard several gunshots in the elephant habitat area, but the team failed to nab the poachers.

Poachers have so far hunted and killed elephants, Sumatran tigers and deer. "We also received information from a fisherman in Ulu Sula that he had just discovered the carcass of an elephant at the national park that was also missing its tusks. Local people refused to identify the poachers, fearing for their own safety," Antara quoted her as saying on Wednesday in Beringin.

FFI has sent a team of several researchers to help Indonesia monitor the population of rare species and a midget tribal group, locally called orang pendek or short men, in the protected forests.

Local people also reported finding two more elephant carcasses missing their tusks in other parts of the national park. It is thought the two were killed in March.

Deborah said that, according to the reports, a group of eight poachers equipped with rifles and traps were still poaching protected species in Muara Air Sumpen and Batang Merangin.

She believes that the poachers are professional hunters, and local people say they were hired by a resident of Jambi city and had been hunting in the park for several years. The TPHS also conducted a special patrol in 2001 following the discovery of four elephant carcasses missing their tusks in the park.

Over the last two years, a motion-automated camera placed by FFI in the national park has detected three major herds of elephants, each with around ten members, and several smaller herds with between three to five members each.

Besides Kerinci national park, the protected species is also found in Aceh, West Sumatra and Lampung.

Forest fires on the rise in Riau and Kalimantan

Jakarta Post - May 29, 2003

Haidir Anwar Tanjung, Pekanbaru -- With the beginning of the dry season, an increasing number of forest fires have been detected in Riau and Kalimantan, raising a thick haze that could disrupt air transportation in the region and neighboring countries, Malaysia and Singapore.

During this month, the local office of the Regional Environmental Impact Management Agency (Bapedalda) in Pekanbaru, Riau, detected a total of 119 hot spots in connection with the rampant conversion of forest areas into farmland and plantations in several regencies.

The hot spots were spreading in five regencies: Bengkalis, Pelalawan, Indragiri Hulu, Siak and Dumai. According to a meteorology report on May 24, there were 16 major hot spots in Indragiri Hulu and Pelalawan.

Riau Bapedalda Chief Ahmad Syah Harrofie regretted that the local administration, especially the local forestry office, had not learned from the past forest fires and haze in the province.

"With the start of the dry season, relevant authorities should take necessary actions to prevent locals and forest concessionaire holders from burning forest areas since it has had a domino effect on the environment," he told The Jakarta Post here on Tuesday.

Ahmad said, "if no actions are taken we will be facing the same fate as in previous years. The haze that starts covering a part of the province, including the city, will disturb the air traffic not only in the province but also in neighboring countries such as Singapore and Malaysia and could cause respiratory problems for locals".

He said further that the conversion of forest fires into farmland and plantations will threaten the habitat of rare species such as the Sumatran Tiger, elephants and rhinos in the province and cause floods during the rainy season.

So far, the local administration has fined a Malaysian company PT Adei Plantation US$1.1 million for burning forest areas and sued five other companies which were allegedly involved in the same case in 2002.

The five companies were PT Sindora Seraya in Rokan Hilir regency, PT Cibaliyung Plantation in Rokan Hilir, Dumai Industrial Zone, PT Tri Bhakti Sarimas in Kuantan Singingi and PT Jatim Jaya Perkasa in Rokan Hilir, Antara reported on Tuesday.

The news agency also reported that the burning of forest areas has been also increasing in Central Kalimantan over the last week, disrupting routine activities in the provincial capital of Palangka Raya.

Chairman of the task force for the handling forest fires in the province Ketut W. Wirawan called on the police and the local forestry office to take strong actions against individuals and forestry companies burning forests in the province.

The provincial administration has deployed hundreds of personnel and tankers to put out the fires. Authorities in West Kalimantan have also taken a similar move to put out fires in several forest areas in the province.

Besides disrupting air transportation in Kalimantan and Riau, the haze last year also caused the deaths of four people due to respiratory problems and disrupted school activities.

Health & education

HIV sneaks up on Indonesia after Suharto

San Francisco Chronicle - June 1, 2003

Simon Montlake -- As recently as 1999, Indonesia idled in the AIDS slow lane. At the time, health officials attempted to curb the spread of the disease by concentrating on the nation's premier high-risk group -- sex workers and their clients.

But soon after the collapse of the authoritarian regime of Gen. Suharto in 1998, illegal drug trafficking rose dramatically. As a result, AIDS workers are now targeting the latest group most apt to acquire the virus -- heroin addicts who share infected needles.

"HIV snuck up on Indonesia and whacked it on the back of the head before anyone knew what was going on," said Wayne Wiebel, regional adviser to Family Health International, a nonprofit group based in Durham, N.C. "We have to stop it from spreading from drug injectors to the wider community."

The Indonesian government estimates there are between 124,000 and 196,000 intravenous drug users, although some health experts say the actual figure is nearly 1 million. The Indonesian AIDS Commission says HIV infection rates among drug addicts have soared from nearly zero in 1998 to more than 50 percent in cities such as Jakarta and Denpasar, the capital of Bali.

Low HIV rate

Yet by Southeast Asian standards, Indonesia remains a nation with a low HIV rate. According to UNAIDS, a United Nations program that monitors the spread of the disease, 130,000 Indonesians have HIV, which is less than 0.1 percent of the population. The US Agency for International Development reports that 43,000 of those who are HIV-positive are intravenous drug users.

Most health workers agree that the HIV rate is increasing sharply -- not only among drug users, but among the estimated 190,000 to 270,000 female and male sex workers and 1 million migrant workers who frequent prostitutes while looking for jobs in construction, mining and forestry throughout the far-flung country.

A National AIDS Commission report shows that between 6 percent and 26 percent of sex workers are HIV-positive. In Jakarta, a study by the University of Indonesia found that the infection rate among transsexual prostitutes known as waria, or "half-man, half-woman," increased from 6 percent in 1997 to 21 percent in 2002. About 10 percent of migrant workers have tested HIV- positive.

Few use condoms

Condom sales have doubled since 1998, to 60 million a year, but use remains low. Fewer than 10 percent of all men say they use them, according to UNAIDS.

"Our distribution is pretty good now, so it's a behavioral issue. The condoms are there -- but will they buy in?" asked Christopher Purdy, country director of DKT International, a Washington-based charity organization that specializes in family planning.

Purdy and others say condom promotion has been hampered by conservative Islamic groups -- about 90 percent of Indonesia's population is Muslim -- whose members believe condoms sanction premarital sex.

Many AIDS activists play down the threat of a religious backlash, pointing to Indonesia's generally moderate form of Islam and the prominent role played by Christian and Muslim groups in successful family-planning programs of the 1970s. "We must do these campaigns gradually if we want to change the attitudes of the people," said Tarmizi Taher, the former minister of religious affairs who now advises Islamic leaders on AIDS-related issues.

The government's battle to contain AIDS has also been jeopardized by scant resources. Only 1.2 percent of the nation's gross domestic product is spent on all health care, one of the lowest rates in Asia. A 1999 law also complicates a national anti-AIDS campaign by giving local districts responsibility over health care matters.

Until now, most resources have been spent on prevention programs and AIDS education, since many Indonesians have little understanding of the disease. A recent UNICEF survey of 1,000 youths between 14 and 17 showed that 84 percent "knew only a little or nothing about HIV/AIDS," while 73 percent didn't know what a condom was.

But as more cases emerge, AIDS activists say, the government will have to expand care and treatment because most Indonesians cannot afford costly anti-retroviral drugs. In February, the government signed an agreement with a local pharmaceutical company called PT Indofarma and the University of Indonesia's medical school to supply generic AIDS drugs for $6.74 a daily dose, a small fraction of the cost of branded versions.

Meanwhile, the government is trying to stem infection rates among drug users by introducing needle exchange and free methadone pilot programs in Bali and Jakarta.

"We try to get them to inject less, say twice a day and not three times a day," said Bambang Eka, a staff physician for the needle exchange program in Jakarta. "Five years ago, we couldn't talk about needle exchanges," said Dewa Wirawan, a member of the Bali AIDS Commission. "But when you have a 50 percent infection rate, it may be too late."

Information on sex and abortion needed

Jakarta Post - May 29, 2003

Arya Abhiseka, Jakarta -- A noted abortion expert said on Wednesday the high number of maternal deaths from unsafe abortions was partly the fault of the media, which has failed to educate the public about the issue.

The national media, according to Kartono Muhammad, often portrays premarital sex and abortion as moral issues, and sensationalizes these issues to sell papers and attract viewers. "Most media outrageously portray women who have abortions as criminals. The media certainly plays a major role in the people's ignorance about abortion," said Kartono.

Abortions are illegal in Indonesia, except in cases where the mother's life is at risk if she carries the fetus to full term. He said he had seen many abortions where the fetus had reached full term. "In those cases, abortion in fact becomes infanticide and is very dangerous to the mother."

Research by Dr. Biran Affandi in 2000 and Dr. Budi Utomo in 2001 showed that between 1.5 million and two million abortions are performed across the country each year. According to data from the Women's Health Foundation (YKP), unsafe abortions account for about 11.1 percent of total maternal deaths.

The Ministry of Health said earlier that maternal deaths resulting from abortions accounted for about 50 percent of all maternal deaths. The maternal mortality rate in Indonesia is 370 per 1,000 births, the highest among the member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. ASEAN comprises Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Brunei and Indonesia.

Unsafe abortion refers to abortions performed with inadequate equipment by traditional midwives. Such procedures often occur in villages.

Kartono, however, disputed the figures, saying many more women died because of unsafe abortions than reported. He said many of these deaths went unreported by those involved.

A recent study by the YKP found that the majority of women seeking abortions were married, over the age of 30 and already had children.

Kartono suggested that more information on sex and abortion should be given to the public by the media, to help reduce the number of deaths as a result of unsafe abortions. "The media should be aware that abortion is no longer a moral issue, but is rather about facing the truth and safety," he said.

He also said the public was still in denial about the fact that society had become more permissive. "Most Indonesians are against abortion, as long as it does not happen to them or their families," Kartono said.

Education bill gives rise to local rivalries

Jakarta Post - May 28, 2003

Jakarta Post, Yogyakarta/Manado -- Regionalism is the latest, unintended consequence of the much-debated national education bill, which has already divided the nation along religious lines.

Thousands of Muslims from the Islamic Solidarity Forum (FUI) held a rally in Yogyakarta on Tuesday to demand the House of Representatives endorse the bill as it is.

The rally was titled, "Yogyakarta people are concerned about education." Unfurling posters and banners expressing their support for the bill, the participants, comprising students, teachers and politicians, marched from four directions: Krapyak Islamic boarding school in the south, Wirobrajan intersection in the west, Tugu intersection in the north and the Muhammadiyah provincial office in the east, to the Gedung Agung presidential palace on Jl.

Ahmad Yani. Rally coordinator Ahmad Adaby Darban said the move was responding to the continuing debate on Article 13 (1a) of the bill, which stipulates that students have the right to obtain religious instruction according to their beliefs, from teachers of the same faith.

"We see that the substance of the article has fulfilled all the requirements to protect students' rights. Prolonging discussion on the article will simply cause national disintegration," said Adaby, who is also a lecturer at the Gadjah Mada University school of cultural studies.

FUI also demanded a clear stance from Governor Sultan Hamengkubuwono X. "Yogyakarta has long been recognized as a center of education. The sultan, as well as the provincial legislature, should not remain silent on the education bill," the statement said, The group incorporates at least 25 different Muslim organizations, including Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah.

The controversial education bill will be debated at the House of Representatives plenary session on June 10, after being delayed several times from its scheduled session on May 2. The House may be forced to a vote after it failed to settle objections raised by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle on the religion article and the objectives of national education, at the last deliberation on May 19.

Previously, all factions in North Sulawesi provincial legislature rejected the bill on the grounds that it tended to create "religious" human beings rather than educated individuals.

"The spirit of the education bill goes against the spirit of the Preamble of the 1945 Constitution, which says that the state aims to educate people," deputy speaker of the legislature Col. Rheinhard Mandagi told The Jakarta Post.

Rheinhard said the education bill gave too much power to the government, allowing it to intervene in school affairs. He added that bill had been rejected after the provincial legislature received calls from local people.

A delegation of councillors met House leaders in Jakarta to convey the rejection from the people of the predominantly Christian province.

Meanwhile, in Medan, North Sumatra, six university rectors have sent a letter to President Megawati Soekarnoputri, House Speaker Akbar Tandjung and People's Consultative Assembly Speaker Amien Rais, to express their opposition to the bill.

The letter was signed by Nomensen University rector Patar M Pasaribu, Catholic St. Thomas University rector Leo L Sipahutar, Methodist Indonesia University rector AP Tambunan, Darma Agung University rector Robert Sibarani, Sisingamangaraja XII University rector MPL Tobing, Pardede Science and Technology Institute rector Agus Salim and Darma Agung Tourism Academy rector S. Is Sihotang.

Sihotang said the bill gave the government too much authority to intervene in religious affairs, which rightly were family matters. "We suggest the House of Representatives accommodate calls to review the bill," he said.

Islam/religion

Indonesia: Radicals steal the spotlight

Asia Times - May 28, 2003

Phar Kim Beng, Hong Kong -- As the international spotlight focuses its glare upon the Bali bombing trial in Jakarta and renewed separatist violence in Aceh, it is all too easy to assume that Indonesia is a hotbed of radical Islam. But this is to ignore the bigger picture, and the distinctive features of Islam as it is practiced in the world's most populous Muslim nation.

The conventional view of Islam in Southeast Asia stresses its peaceful and moderate aspects. Azyumardi Azra, rector of the State Institute for Islamic Studies (IAIN), says it is "simplistic" to think of Indonesian Islam as the same as Islam in the Middle East. Former president Abdulrahman Wahid added: "The difference between Islam in Saudi Arabia and Indonesia is that the former does not know the difference between Islam and its culture."

Indonesian Islam gained its presence in slow and peaceful penetration over the centuries. In the process, it integrated with folkloric beliefs and local customs. Because of the less rigid structure of Indonesian traditional society (including the active role of women in public life), it is also more tolerant and inclusive. The inheritance laws in Minangkabau in Sumatra, for instance, are matriarchal.

Although there are up to 100,000 Islamic schools (pesantren) in Indonesia, links with the West remain strong, especially among the leading elites. Nurcholish Majid, by far the most important intellectual in Indonesia, has a PhD from the University of Chicago, a distinction shared with Amien Rais, the current Speaker of the Indonesian parliament. Azyumardi Azra, who has considerable influence among Muslims in Indonesia, is himself a PhD holder from Columbia University in New York, with a dissertation on the network of ulama or religious scholars in Indonesia and the Middle East.

Facilitated by the role of IAIN, investments in universities and educational exchanges have also spawned a new Islamic elite that moves easily between the Muslim and Western worlds. Thus, while there are many versions of Islam with competing interpretations, it is invariably the liberal and tolerant version that remains the dominant one.

Indeed, Indonesian Islam is not necessarily in contradiction to democratic values that stress the importance of government accountability and transparency -- a repudiation of the thesis peddled by Bernard Lewis of Princeton University that Islam and democracy cannot co-exist. To the extent that there is radical Islamic activism of the Wahhabi variety in Indonesia, it has been concentrated in Aceh, which is fighting a separatist war. The radical Islam of Aceh has not proliferated to other parts of Indonesia. If anything, its austere Islam has remained localized, this despite its ongoing conflict with Jakarta -- a 27-year quarrel that is poised to be prolonged given the collapse of the recent peace initiative.

Granted that the general characteristic of Indonesian Islam is moderate, how then do we account for the increasing radicalization of political Islam in Indonesia?

As recently as April 27, a bomb exploded in Jakarta's international airport, injuring 11 people. Although no one claimed responsibility for the bombing, the blast came four days after Abu Bakar Ba'asyir -- the alleged spiritual leader of the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic group Jemaah Islamiyah -- went on trial for treason. It also followed the arrest of 18 members of the group, including three wanted in the October 12 Bali bombings that killed 202 people.

To be sure, political violence is neither novel nor new in Indonesia. It has a pedigree from the very beginning of modern Indonesia. Under its first president Sukarno, Indonesia was a major source of insecurity during the first half of the 1960s.

However, what differentiates the previous spasm of violence from the current one is the absence of any intense ideological rivalry. The emerging Islamic parties are involved in political violence almost by default, due to failure to control their party members.

Unlike Indonesian politics of the 1950s, which had the participation of Islamic parties, currently individuals are more important than the Islamic parties they seek to represent. And they can't exert complete control on their party machineries yet.

Hence, powerful individuals, rather than parties, continue to maneuver for office, with some of their members resorting to unsavory methods to advance their objectives. This is getting even more intense given the impending elections of next year.

The two most doctrinaire parties, PPP (Partai Persatuan Pembagunan), otherwise known as the United Development Party, and PBB (Partai Bulan Bintang), for instance, continue to focus on the Jakarta Charter, a proposition that was defeated in the 1945 constitution that held that Muslims must follow sharia or Islamic law. Yet both are not above the use of physical intimidation.

In fact, no party had a paramilitary wing in the 1950s. According to the findings of Greg Fealy, a lecturer in Southeast Asian politics and history at Australian National University: "Now every party, Islamic or otherwise, has an auxiliary organization, from well-trained cadres to ordinary hooligans."

Some even believe that groups such as Laskar Jihad, which has now been disbanded, existed with the patronage and support of the Indonesian military.

This speaks as much about the perilous state of the Indonesian government, which is unable to control the activities of radical Islamic parties or groups, as about the weak social structure of Indonesia.

In fact, the social structure of Indonesia remains very much shaped by transmigration and economic migrants. Today's Islamic radicals also grew up in the 1970s and 1980s, at the height of Suharto's New Order. They are currently motivated to taste power in the vacuum, which reinforces their aggressive tactics. Economic hardship and weak government enforcement have also strengthened their level of aggression and frustration.

Said Rizal Sukma, the director of studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta: "There are now 40 million people unemployed, with 1.3 million internally displaced refugees from ethnic and religious conflicts."

Furthermore, up to 70 percent of the entire Muslim population, currently estimated to be 212 million people, lives mainly in Java and Sumatra. The collective social and political pressures cannot be anything but acute. Indeed, to put it bluntly, the problem of radical Islam in Indonesia may not so much be religious as it is social and political. It is for this reason that almost all cases of political violence perpetrated in the name of Islam have been urban-based.

Nevertheless, the specter of radical Islam in Indonesia should be assessed in perspective. The largest mainstream Muslim organizations, the Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammdiyah, have been overshadowed by media attention to radical groups. In keeping with the news momentum generated by the horrific attacks of September 11, 2001, followed by the bombings in Bali last October 12, the media have trained their sights on FPI (Front Pembela Islam), Laskar Jihad, the MMI (Majlis Mujahideen Indonesia), otherwise known as the Indonesian Council of Jihad Fighters, and JAMI (Jemaah al Ikhwan al Muslimin Indonesia).

These four Islamic groups share one characteristic: FPI's Habib Rizq Shihab, Laskar Jihad's Jafar Umar Thalib, MMI's Abu Bakar Ba'asyir and Habib al Habsyi of JAMI are all of Arab descent. These groups preach a literal interpretation of Islam and claim that Muslims should practice only "pure" Islam as practiced by the Prophet Mohammed and his companions.

Be that as it may, while all radical groups in Indonesia have some connections with theological or organizational groups elsewhere, including the Middle East, it is difficult to establish a connection with al-Qaeda. The International Crisis Group (ICG) in Jakarta has not found any links between al-Qaeda and these groups.

In fact, leaders of the FPI, Laskar Jihad and JAMI have criticized Osama bin Laden (only the MMI has withheld such criticism). If their disavowal of al-Qaeda is to be believed, their statements imply that radical as they may be, they are still trying to work within the local ambit of Indonesian politics, which remain convoluted and saddled with corruption.

At the same time, the Islamic parties are themselves unable to rein in the members of their overzealous members. This is especially true with the individuals leading the parties. As they too are no less ambitious, creating a pernicious dynamic where Islam is easily abused for the sake of power politics.

International solidarity

Arrested for protesting in Jakarta

Green Left Weekly - May 28, 2003

Nick Everett -- On May 21, I was arrested for attending a protest in Jakarta. Australian Books not Bombs convener Kylie Moon, South Korean student activist Yung-Chan Choi and South African anti-war activist Lydia Cairncross were also arrested. The four of us had been in Jakarta attending the Global Peace Movements Conference, held at the Wisata Hotel, which is near the site of the demonstration. We were all deported on the evening of May 22.

May 21 was the fifth anniversary of the overthrow of Indonesian dictator Suharto. In many provinces throughout Indonesia, demonstrations were planned -- both to celebrate the anniversary and to protest the stalling of democratic reforms and the deteriorating economic situation.

Two days before the demonstrations, the Indonesian government declared the province of Aceh under martial law. This declaration coincided with the commencement of military attacks in Aceh involving bombings, shootings and abductions of civilians.

Four-hundred protesters, mostly members of the radical Peoples Democratic Party (PRD), the National Democratic Student League (LMND) and the Indonesian National Front for Workers Struggle (FNPBI), assembled outside Hotel Indonesia at 1.30pm. The protesters marched to the Jakarta office of the International Monetary Fund, where the rally was addressed by Cairncross and Australian Socialist Alliance co-convenor David Glanz. Expressing her solidarity with Indonesia's poor, Cairncross explained how South Africa's authoritarian apartheid regime had been replaced by a new regime of privatisation and deregulation under the African National Congress government.

As the march made its way to the US embassy, it was joined by several more international delegates from the Global Peace Movements Conference, which had just concluded. Outside the US embassy, the rally was addressed by Bob Wing, editor of War Times and a leader of the US anti-war coalition United for Peace and Justice, PRD general secretary Natalia Scholastika, FNPBI chairperson Dita Sari and myself. Sari addressed the link between the US war on Iraq and the Indonesian government's war on Aceh, noting that both were motivated by the thirst for profits by the world's biggest oil corporations.

We then moved on to the Presidential Palace to meet up with other protesters. Four different rallies were organised in Jakarta that day, including a protest by 800 students and workers that had marched from Bandung.

After arriving at the Presidential Palace, the demonstration was addressed by Moon. As she began her speech, riot and mobile brigade (BriMob) police began to surround the protesters.

"In the middle of my speech the military began to approach the truck", explained Moon. "I jumped off the truck into a sea of activists who protected me, forming a mobile blockade around me. "The Indonesian activists linked arms and legs to protect me and three other international participants from a violent attack by the police, who started laying in with batons."

Moon and I both believe that the police attack was directly linked with the imposition of martial law in Aceh. The military is trying to reassert its role in Indonesian political life.

Three Indonesians were also arrested, including the chair of the rally, PRD Jakarta secretary Zeli Ariane. Protests were also repressed by the police in Pekanbaru in Riau, Makassar in South Sulawesi, and Purwokerto in Central Java.

Following our capture by police, we were taken in two cars to the offices of the police intelligence unit, where we were interrogated and held until the following morning.

We were in custody for more than 30 hours. We did not know when we would be released or what charges there would be. For much of that time we had no phone contact. We were interrogated until 4.30am -- Intel are not used to being held accountable or having any restrictions on what they do to protesters.

"While I knew that we would be okay because we are foreigners, I kept thinking about what it would be like for Indonesian comrades", Moon told me. We knew at the time, that there were three PRD members being held by police that were being beaten and possibly tortured. All three have subsequently been released.

On the morning of May 22, the four of us were transferred to the immigration department, where we met up with other conference delegates who had come to express their solidarity.

Immigration officials -- without interviewing us -- accepted the judgement of the police that we had breached immigration regulations by participating in a protest and should be deported.

All of us had informed the Indonesian government of our plans to attend a conference in our visa applications and the police were notified of both the conference and the street rally by the events' organisers as required by a 1998 law on "freedom of expression".

Delegates from 26 countries attended the Global Peace Movements Conference, which adopted a statement demanding an end to martial law and all military action in Aceh. The conference also resolved to organise a peace mission to Aceh to investigate the human rights situation as part of a global response to the conflict.

Moon summed up the feeling of all the foreign arrestees, when she said, "My own experience of what happened -- although stressful and alarming -- was a small price to pay for helping to bring international media attention to the situation." Moon and I urge more Australians to take notice of the war being waged in Aceh and the stifling of dissent in Indonesia.

We need to bring a lot more pressure to bear on our own government and its military ties with Indonesia. Unfortunately, the Australian government has not learnt from the experience of East Timor. The Australian government has rejected the Acehnese people's right to self-determination. Canberra's continued military ties with Jakarta make it complicit in the war on the Acehnese people and suppression democratic rights in Indonesia.

Economy & investment

Rupiah touches 33-month high against dollar

Jakarta Post - May 26, 2003

Jakarta -- Rupiah on Monday reached its highest level against the dollar since August 2000, sparking concerns that the upturn could be overdone and harm the country's exports.

As of early afternoon the rupiah was at 8,145/8,155 to the dollar. The absence of central ank intervention to halt the appreciation indicates that Bank Indonesia is comfortable with the current level, said G.K. Goh Stockbrokers economist Song Seng Wun.

Bank Indonesia governor Burhanuddin Abdullah has said a strong currency is important for the country and urged exporters to boost efficiency to minimise the impact on export revenues. "I guess the market wants to test the 8,000 level before it starts to take profit," Song told financial newswire AFX-Asia, adding that the market is also waiting for Bank Indonesia's reaction.

Fundamentally the rupiah should "at best" reach a level of around 8,200-8,300, he said. "Beyond 8,200/8,300, it is an excessive appreciation within a short period of time," Song said, adding that the gain has not been supported by a change in economic fundamentals.

A stronger rupiah is a useful weapon in efforts to bring down inflation as well as the debt burden but it will not help exports, he said. He believed the rupiah was partly supported by a continuing fund inflow as well as ongoing assets sales.

These include the divestment of government stakes in banks to foreign investors and other smaller assets sale such as the divestment of the Astra International stake in Toyota Astra Motor to Toyota Corp.