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Indonesia News Digest No 43 - November 3-9, 2003
Reuters - November 7, 2003
Achmad Sukarsono, Jakarta -- Indonesia warned against foreign
meddling on Friday after the United States, Europe and Japan
expressed concern over Jakarta's decision to extend martial law
in rebellious Aceh province.
Indonesia extended martial law in Aceh, on the northern tip of
Sumatra island, for six months on Thursday and shortly afterwards
the three main aid donors issued a joint statement saying they
hoped the emergency would end as soon as possible.
"The statement issued by the parties ... is regrettable because
it was out of place and leading to meddling," Foreign Ministry
spokesman Marty Natalegawa told reporters.
While agreeing with Jakarta that Aceh is an integral part of
Indonesia, the three powers have tried to encourage a political
solution since last year, promising aid as an incentive.
They sponsored talks between Jakarta and the separatist Free Aceh
Movement (GAM) in Tokyo, which collapsed in May. Jakarta then
imposed martial law in the war-torn province and launched a big
police and military operation to crush the rebels within six
months.
The spokesman said the United States, Europe and Japan should
press the rebels to surrender. "International support on the
territorial integrity of Indonesia should have been shown by
pressing GAM to lay down their weapons," Natalegawa said.
Chief security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has said the
six-month extension, aimed at finishing off GAM, would be re-
evaluated monthly and could be cut short or extended. He also
said an economic recovery programme would be included in the Aceh
operation and the government would pardon GAM members who
surrender.
Megawati has received broad political support for her Aceh
policies. But in a sign that could fade as the operation grinds
on, parliament speaker Akbar Tandjung called for the lifting of
martial law before the country's 2004 elections. "How can a
democratic process be done in a martial law environment? That's a
contradiction," he told reporters.
Indonesia holds parliamentary elections on April 5, 2004, to be
followed by a presidential election on July 5.
Aceh Vice Governor Azwar Abubakar told Reuters this week he was
optimistic the major parties would compete in a lively election
campaign in the province, but there would be no room for pro-
independence candidates.
The Aceh offensive involves about 45,000 military and police
against an estimated 5,000 rebels. GAM has been fighting for 27
years, surviving numerous offensives. Before the latest
offensive, about 10,000 people, most of them civilians, had been
killed.
The military says it has killed or captured nearly 2,000 GAM
members in the latest offensive but casualty figures are
difficult to verify because of restricted access to the province.
[With additional reporting by Telly Nathalia.]
Kompas - November 9, 2003
Jakarta - Condemnations against the government's decision to
extend the military emergency in Aceh continue to spring up. On
Saturday November 8, hundreds of people from Aceh Papua
Solidarity (SAP) demonstrated, not just against the policy of
extending the military emergency in Aceh but also the division of
Papua [into three separate provinces].
From the Hotel Indonesia roundabout they moved off to the
representative offices of the United Nations, the offices of the
Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security and the
Presidential Palace. [Because this is the Muslim fasting month]
the demonstration ended with a breaking of fast and a religious
service at the Istiqlal Mosque.
Starting at 3pm, the demonstrators moved off carrying banners and
posters. At the front of the first line of demonstrators a number
of women and men wore traditional Acehnese clothing and held
Achenese daggers (rencong) in their hands while they yelled
"People Unite, End the Military Emergency in Aceh".
On two of the banners carried by SAP was written "Hold a Dialogue
which is Broad and Democratic with the People of Papua, Hold
Negotiations which Involve Components of Acehnese and Papuan
Society". One large poster had the writing "Revoke the Military
Emergency in Aceh and Withdraw All Non-organic Troops from Aceh
and Papua, End the Separation of Papua, Reject Elections Under a
Military Emergency".
In front of the Presidential Palace, they stopped and a number of
people climbed on to a pickup to give speeches. Police security
in front of the palace meanwhile appeared tight.
The demonstrators also distributed leaflets to the drivers of
cars and motorcycles on the main street. Inside was a statement
rejecting the extension of the military emergency in Aceh and the
separation of Papua. This caused a traffic jam with a number of
drivers who were anxious to find out what was happening stopping
in front of the palace to watch the action.
During a break in the demonstration, SAP coordinator, Jusuf
Lakaseng, said that President Megawati's decision to extend the
military emergency was wrong. Because of this, he urged the
government to revoke the military emergency and hold a dialogue
with the people of Aceh and Papua. "This will only add to the
suffering of the Acehnese people. The six month military
emergency has resulted in the deaths of 304 people, scores of
women have been raped and tens of thousands of people have been
made refugees. Forty per cent of those of a productive age have
lost their jobs because of the military emergency", explained
Lakaseng.
In its written statement, SAP made the assessment that the
military operation had failed to win the hearts and minds of the
people. Because of this, it is irrational and counterproductive
to extend an operation which is claimed [by the government] to
seek to win the hearts of the people.
SAP is concerned that ignoring the open resistance of the Papuan
people to the policy of separating the province will result in a
view that the 2004 general elections are only a political tool of
the central government to enforce their political wishes.
(SIE/WIN)
[Translated by James Balowski.]
West Papua
Government & politics
2004 elections
Corruption/collusion/nepotism
Human rights/law
Informal sector/urban poor
Environment
Islam/religion
Military ties
Economy & investment
Aceh
Indonesia warns against meddling in Aceh
Demonstration rejects extension of military emergency
2500 people to demonstrate against military emergency in Aceh
Detik.com - November 8, 2003
Hestiana Dharmastuti, Jakarta - Around 2500 people from Aceh Papua Solidarity (Solidaritas Aceh Papua, SAP) will hold a demonstration rejecting the extension of the military emergency in Aceh. The demonstrators will hold a long march from the Hotel Indonesia roundabout to the offices of the Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security and the Presidential Palace.
This action, which will have the theme "People's Carnival to Oppose Militarism and to Build Solidarity with Aceh and Papua", will be held on Saturday November 8 at 2pm. Joining the action will be scores of non-government organisations including the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras), the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI), the Institute for Policy Research and Advocacy (Elsam), the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation, the Center for Electoral Reform (Cetro), the People's United Opposition Party (POPOR) and the Indonesian Front for Labour Struggle (FNPBI).
"We will demand that the military emergency be revoked. The six month extension of the military emergency will only add to the suffering of the Acehnese people. It would be better if the government's approach is one of dialogue and promoting a feeling of justice", SAP coordinator Yusuf Lakaseng told Detik.com in Jakarta.
As is normal with a carnival, some of the demonstrators which will attend will wear traditional Acehnese and Papuan clothing. As well as this, they will bring 1000 posters and hold speeches and a happening art action.
The demonstrators will also reject holding the general elections in Aceh and Papua in 2004 because the government has no policy to resolve the conflict peacefully, democratically and without military force. (aan)
[Translated by James Balowski.]
Reuters - November 5, 2003
Jerry Norton, Banda Aceh -- It looks like its going to be a long haul for Indonesian security forces fighting separatist rebels in Aceh.
The government is expected to announce on Thursday an extension of martial law in the province, and security officials in the provincial capital of 400,000 are careful to avoid predicting when it and the military campaign will end.
That was not supposed to be the scenario when 45,000 military and police began a six-month offensive in May against about 5,000 Free Aceh Movement (GAM) fighters in the resource-rich, staunchly Muslim province on the northern tip of Sumatra island.
Indonesian military (TNI) chief Endriartono Sutarto told his troops their job was "to destroy the armed forces of GAM through to their roots", reducing it to its "smallest unit" in six months, a target that coincided with the planned end of martial law in the province.
But in September, Sutarto said: "We can't pinpoint when we can paralyse GAM," adding that whether martial law was extended was up to President Megawati Sukarnoputri. It seems nearly a certainty that she will.
Does that mean the campaign, launched with a parachute drop of hundreds of troops, has had no successes? Not according to Sutarto, who said it had reduced GAM's strength.
Conditions have become safer, the Aceh military spokesman, Colonel Ditya Soedarsono, said this week in the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, 1,700 km northwest of Jakarta.
"Transportation in Aceh is running very well and the food supply is not upset," he said. Certainly there is no sense of danger at the military headquarters where Soedarsono is based.
More soldiers have cell phones than sidearms holstered on belts. A single sentry guards the drive to the main door.
'Relatively good'
Banda Aceh as a whole resembled an armed camp in May, with armoured vehicles, rifle-toting soldiers and checkpoints, but now there is little to suggest anything but normality. In contrast, hotels and office buildings in Jakarta, where Muslim militants have launched bomb attacks, have more guards and barricades.
Many citizens say they feel safer now, and a human rights activist critical of martial law said improvements were not confined to the capital. "We have to concede the situation is relatively good now outside of Banda Aceh," the activist said.
But TNI spokesman Soedarsono said problems remain. "There are key persons from GAM who are not captured yet, and these key persons will make problems in the future because they will seek revenge." Soedarsono's police counterpart, Colonel Sayed Hoesainy, said GAM fighters had stashed weapons. "And if the security operation stops, then the GAM will return and they will take the guns back." Security officials also spoke of GAM members "melting into society" ready to strike again, as well as maintaining fighting units in remote and rugged parts of the mountainous province, harassing farmers and fishermen.
A Jakarta-based Western diplomat who declined to be identified said the campaign had achieved some success. "That said, the government has not destroyed GAM as a military force and has not captured major GAM military figures."
Hearts and minds
GAM has been fighting the government for 27 years, surviving numerous offensives. Before the latest, about 10,000 people, most of them civilians, had been killed. In this campaign, official counts say the military has killed more than 1,000 rebels and captured nearly 900, while security forces have suffered dead in double-digits.
GAM has told a different story, and has also said the government was responsible for significant civilian casualties. Soedarsono denied that, saying military tactics were designed to avoid civilian deaths.
Casualty figures are hard to verify. The government restricts entry and movement in the province of four million by media and other observers.
Security officials said they were working to win public support and backed non-military elements of the offensive such as improving humanitarian and political conditions.
The Western diplomat said that while military pressure might eventually force a negotiated peace, it could backfire by creating more alienated Acehnese and rebel recruits.
Fachry Ali, an analyst at a Jakarta-based think-tank, told Reuters: "From the start I'm against the military operation, but now we are at a point where pulling out completely is not feasible." Comparing the situation to the US position in Iraq, he added: "I'm afraid if troops pull out now there will be more chaos because those who have been suffering from the operation may take revenge against those who have been siding with the troops."
Jakarta Post - November 5, 2003
Tiarma Siboro, Jakarta -- Experts criticized on Tuesday the government's decision to extend military offensive in troubled Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam, arguing that the five-month operation had served as a proof that security approach could not resolve the Aceh question.
Noted sociologist Thamrin Amal Tamagola from the University of Indonesia (UI) and rights campaigners Munir and Usman Hamid stressed militaristic approach would yield no result even if Jakarta extends the martial law for years.
"The government should consider a non-militaristic way to solve the Aceh question because the military has failed to restore security and bring about a normal life for Acehnese.
"Jakarta's decision has only showed that the government has no concept in dealing with the Aceh question," Thamrin said during a seminar here on Tuesday. "The government should focus on the Acehnese's welfare and, indeed, there are no progress about this so far," he said.
Rights activists Munir from the Indonesian Human Rights Monitor (Impartial) and Usman Hamid from the National Commission on Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) said the government decision catered to the needs of military and certain political elements in the country.
The government on Monday decided to extend the martial law and the joint operations in Aceh, admitting that the separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM) had remained strong six months into the military offensive in the troubled province.
President Megawati Soekarnoputri issued a decree in May imposing martial law in Aceh for a period of six months in a bid to crack down on GAM rebels who have been fighting for independence for the resource-rich province since 1976. Over 10,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed since then.
Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said after a cabinet meeting on Monday that in terms of personnel and weaponry, GAM rebels "remain strong and they have changed their tactics to full guerrilla warfare." The cabinet meeting, nevertheless, has yet to decide on the duration of the military operation.
The military had earlier said that it would easily beat the 5,000-strong rebels by conducting counter-guerrilla tactics repeatedly voiced that it would end the struggle within months.
The Indonesian Military (TNI) chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto admitted on Tuesday that for the time being, he has yet to employ new tactics to crush the guerrillas.
"With the extension of martial law in Aceh, we have yet to decide on the new method or strategy to hunt down the guerrillas," Endriartono said after attending a special meeting on general elections at Susilo's office on Tuesday.
Both Munir and Usman said the government has also made public lies by saying that the extension of military campaign was badly needed because "most Acehnese demanded so."
"Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has said that local ulemas and other representatives of Acehnese civilian have demanded Jakarta to extend the martial law for what they claimed that they were happy with the current situation in Aceh. But it was a lie because he [Susilo] did not listen to other voice from the people who have been suffering the most due to the ongoing war," they said in a joint statement.
"GAM has been conducting armed struggle for more than two-decades and, indeed, it was also a public lie if Susilo said that the rebels had already changed their tactics," they said.
Both Munir and Usman said the military had developed a permanent relationship with local politicians in Aceh to maintain "an emergency structure" in the province which, of course, "will grant an extra power to the military and sideline civilian participation in solving the Aceh questions." "The government's decision has also showed an ignorance to the rampant rights abuses in Aceh," they said.
| West Papua |
Eureka Street Magazine - November 3, 2003
July 6 was the anniversary of one of the shameful events in Australia's relationship with Indonesia. In July 1998 on Biak's tiny island just north of Australia -- the Indonesian military carried out a massacre of more than 100 people, mostly women. And to Australia's shame, despite an intelligence investigation confirming that it happened, the Australian government refused to condemn the massacre, and to this day has refused to release the report.
I was in Biak last year and although the island is visually a tropical paradise, the experience was disturbing. The scars of the horrific events that took place on July 6, five years ago, have not healed. Nor have the scars of 40 years of constant, and at times deadly, intimidation by the Indonesian police and military.
In Biak, perhaps more than any other place I visited in West Papua, the fear of Indonesian intimidation and violence is palpable. As I travelled around Biak with my wife, I felt it was eerily unlike other places we had been. Teenage girls and young women did not engage us with their eyes or a smile. Fear and shame were written on their faces.
West Papua, less than 200 kilometres from Australia, was handed over to Indonesia in 1963 following the New York Agreement. This ended a long-running dispute between the Netherlands and Indonesia over the former Dutch colony. In 1969 a hotly disputed vote by just 1025 Indonesian-picked Papuans confirmed that West Papua would remain part of Indonesia. This vote was recently called a "whitewash" by the United Nations Under-Secretary- General who supervised the hand-over of West Papua to Indonesia.
The Papuan Women's Solidarity Group was established to support victims of the massacre. At a meeting of the group in Biak town, I was told that all Biak women live with the very real threat of physical or sexual violence every day of their lives, and they have done so for 40 years. The women described the monthly dances in remote villages, organised by the military, that every young woman, including those who are married, must attend. At these dances, or after, often at their homes, the women are raped by the soldiers -- and the families and husbands are powerless to do anything.
The day after this meeting, on a crowded public taxi driven by an off-duty member of Indonesia's paramilitary police, Brimod, I witnessed a minor example of the sort of everyday harassment that's commonplace on Biak. When a young village woman with a basket of freshly caught fish stepped out of the taxi at the local market, the driver reached across and helped himself to two fish from her basket.
The details of the 1998 massacre are overwhelming. More than 20 women and a few men, victims of or witnesses to the atrocities, crowded into the co-ordinator's house for the Papuan Women's Solidarity Group meeting. They told me that at 5am the army opened fire on a crowd of sleeping young people at the harbour, who had been guarding their Morning Star flag, raised a few days earlier.
The entire population of Biak town was rounded up at gunpoint and forced to the harbour area, where for the whole day they were subjected to physical and sexual abuses, including the young children. More than 100 people -- mostly women, some with babies and young children -- were rounded up and forced on board two naval vessels, where they were stripped, killed and their bodies mutilated and dumped at sea.
Hundreds were detained in the police station and at an army base for three days after the massacre. Many of the wounded had to go back to their villages without medical attention because the military prevented the hospital from treating them. Many people are still missing.
The community of Biak Island had joined in the independence demonstrations that were taking place across West Papua in July 1998. There was greater openness and a feeling of hope following the overthrow of President Suharto, and new President Habibie had made encouraging moves toward dialogue over East Timor.
The Biak women made flags and banners and a Morning Star flag was flown from the water tower at the harbour. On 2 July, police and military made a tentative attempt to remove the flag and stop the celebrations, but withdrew because they were outnumbered by the demonstrators. More than 100 armed military reinforcements were brought in from Ambon, and at 5am on 6 July they began their military assault on the demonstrators and the population of Biak town.
A witness who had a physical disability described how he was forced on board one of the naval vessels, but was thrown overboard by a sympathetic sailor as the frigate put to sea. He told how the women were stripped as the ship sailed out to sea. Nobody knows exactly what happened to the people on board, as no- one survived.
In the weeks that followed, a church report claims that bodies floated ashore, some with limbs cut off, women with breasts removed, men with penises cut off. The bodies of two women washed ashore on an outer island -- they were tied together at their legs and their vaginas had been crammed with newspaper. Churches on Biak have documented the recovery of a total of 70 bodies, including those of young children, that either washed ashore or were recovered from fishing nets.
Sketchy reports about the massacre filtered out. But it was not until two Australian aid workers who were present during the massacre, Rebecca Casey and Paul Meixner, returned to Australia and told their story that a few reports began to appear in the Australian media. The Sydney Morning Herald ran a story in November 1998. The two aid workers did not witness the killings and beatings -- they had been told by Biak friends to hide in a house for three days.
The fate of five Australian journalists who witnessed the invasion of East Timor in 1975 must surely have been on their minds. Despite having authorised an official intelligence report into the massacre -- compiled by Major Dan Weadon, an intelligence officer attached to the Jakarta embassy -- the Australian Government refused to publicly condemn the Indonesian atrocities. And despite attempts by the Australia West Papua Association, including an unsuccessful "Freedom of Information" application, the Weadon report has never been made public.
In an article in the Sun-Herald in November 2001, Captain Andrew Plunkett, a serving intelligence officer with the Australian Defence Force, claimed that the Biak massacre "was a dress rehearsal for the TNI [Indonesian army] in East Timor". And, in what the Sun-Herald article described as a "stunning and unorthodox attack on foreign policy by a serving officer", Captain Plunkett went on to accuse the Australian Government of "giving a green light" to the Indonesian military's subsequent atrocities in East Timor "by turning a blind eye and not raising an official public protest" against Indonesia's behaviour in Biak.
It's a testimony to the strength and integrity of Papuan people that despite the years of abuse by Indonesian security forces, they have maintained their 1988 pledge to pursue a non-violent struggle based, as they say, on "love and peace".
At the end of my meeting with the Biak women, they told me that they would like to be able to travel overseas and tell the story of the massacre to the outside world -- a world that has, for 40 years, ignored the plight of these people. And as I was leaving, in a show of solidarity and defiance the women chanted Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka! -- Freedom! Freedom! Freedom!.
[Kel Dummett is a Melbourne academic and writer.]
Radio Australia - November 7, 2003
The separatist movement in Indonesia's Papua province took a major blow this week after the military claimed it killed 10 separatist rebels, including leader Yustinus Murib. But church leaders in Papua say they too have been targetted by the special forces, Kopassus, and subjected to surveillance, intimidation and even murder. Since 1963, when Indonesia took hold of the province, Christianity has flourished, despite an influx of Islamic migrants and despite Indonesia being the world's largest muslim country.
Presenter/Interviewer: Tricia Fitzgerald reports
Speakers: Pastor Benny Giay, Papua church leader
Catholic missionaries moved into southern Papua in the early 1900's, protestants arrived later from Holland and Germany and worked in the north and evangelical American missionaries arrived after the Second World War and began conversions in the highlands.
By the 1960's when Indonesia took control of the province, local Papuans had started taking up leadership positions in the church, and Christianity had started to become a symbol of Papuan identity and difference.
Benny Giay is one of Papua's most respected church leaders ... a lecturer at the theological college, and a leader of the Papuan independent church's Peace and Justice Bureau. He says there has always been suspicion between Papua and Jakarta over religious differences.
Giay: Papua is upon hearing that Indonesia was going to takeover West Papua, they were saying eh these are Muslims and these are Malays. We have different identity, we have different culture, different religion.
So when Indonesia took over West Papua, they realised the church was very much a part of West Papuans life. So there was a strategy made by intelligence actually where they had a document which published by intelligence saying that the church West Papua was supporting the movement. So I mean this was how the Indonesians tried to weaken the positionary church.
Fitzgerald: At the time of the Indonesian takeover the churches were running the province's education system, and Jakarta moved quickly to take over that role. Pastor Giay says the new Indonesian republic was deeply suspicous of the loyalty Papuans had for their Christian religion.
Giay: In terms of identity and spirituality West Papuans out there. Indonesians took over the school system and West Papuans initiative spirit to defend themselves, spirit to develop their identity was killed, was weakened, because by then, all the text books were preparing Jakarta, not only that school teachers also were paid by the government, brought in from Jakarta. That's how the government tried to deprive Papuans means and inspirations to develop their identity for future.
Fitzgerald: Jakarta not only moved into the schools, it banned books and publications by Papuan writers, with many books only taken off the prohibited list by former President Abdurachman Wahid, in early 2000.
Giay: I have a list of books which were written by Papuans, books on history, culture, dance which were seen by Indonesian as backward may be or primitive which according to Indonesian can prefer the people from becoming a part of Indonesia.
Indonesia is may be seen as a modern culture, so West Papuan culture has been undermined and in order for Papuans be part of Indonesia and accept the Indonesian culture, the Indonesian identity, the Indonesian history.
Fitzgerald: Pastor Giay says Jakarta has remained suspcicious of the christian churches' link to seperatisim, so has put in place a system of surveillance and intimidation of church leaders.
Giay: The strategy used now is to go into church, follow someone's and take notes of their sermons and analysing, just as a way of intimidating the pastor.
Fitzgerald: And what about killings and arrests of religious leaders?
Giay: Ah terror, yes, intimidation yes. We have a lot of pastors who have been killed, like in 1995 incident in where at least one pastor was slaughtered right in the pulpit with his family. Another pastor was shot dead in 1997, yeah '97. The Indonesians went in and killed several pastors.
Fitzgerald: Since 1992, Christian churches have become more involved in trying stop human rights abuses by the Indonesian military against Papuans. And health conditions are becoming a new battleground for the church.
Health services are minimal in the province and Pastor Giay is receieving reports of dozens of Papuans dying every month from unknown diseases. He says many Papuans believe the deaths are somehow connected to what they see as a desire by some in Jakarta for them to disappear as a people.
Giay: We have a lot of Papuans dying, a lot of Papuans dying. In January, I had reports of 50 to 70 people dying within 2 months -- sickness caused malnutrtion I don't know. These Papuans are dying. Last year around June and July, 50 to 70 people dying within 3 weeks. These are people from the Mountains -- the health situation is worsening.
Courier mail (Brisbane) - November 8, 2003
Greg Poulgrain -- The Jakarta media yesterday strongly criticised Indonesian army personnel who shot dead nine Papuans in a pre- dawn raid in the highlands of West Papua.
The front-page Indonesia Pos photograph showed "four soldiers treating the body of a Free Papua Movement (OPM) rebel like an animal they had hunted and killed". The English-language Jakarta Post said that "even in the most brutal of wars such behaviour is intolerable". It added: "If a person can still say there is nothing wrong with four soldiers treating a corpse in this manner, then we may conclude that there is something wrong with that person's mind."
Amien Rais, speaker of the People's Consultative Assembly, spoke more directly when he said that Indonesia was suffering from "a foul smell everywhere". It was not clear whether he was referring to the death toll caused by the army in Papua, Aceh, Maluku, Sulawesi and other Indonesian localities, or to the army itself. When President Megawati Sukarnoputri's top minister, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, in charge of political and security affairs, visited Australia last month, he denied any troop build-up in Papua.
Yet Papuan church and human rights groups, such as Elsham, are alarmed by the rapid increase in troops during the past six months. There are now estimated to be more than 35,000 soldiers in the province and sources have reported provocativeincidents at Wamena and Timika. They say that in the hills behind Jayapura, the capital of West Papua, for two hours every afternoon for several months, the army has been practising, firing thousands of rounds. Local Papuans have been asking whom the soldiers are going to shoot. Recent reports have said that 3000 more troops will land this month at Nabire on the northern coastline.
They are said to be equipped with gold-mining gear to take part in the gold rush that started 50km inland several years ago. Mr Yudhoyono has recently drawn attention to the high cost of fighting terrorism and separatism in Aceh and Papua, saying it has been "draining his country's struggling economy".
Sections of the Jakarta media have criticised army strategy and the exorbitant cost of its open war in Aceh; but Papuan rights groups say the undercover campaign in their province is against a population calling for peaceful dialogue. They also say the army's answer is provocation, with prominent political figures and educated Papuans targeted.
During the past 30 months, more than 1000 Papuans have died at the hands of Kopassus special forces. It has been alleged that some of these people have been poisoned. The shooting of two Americans near the Freeport mine last year caused the US Congress to refuse training for Kopassus.
Jakarta Post - November 7, 2003
Nethy Dharma Somba and Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jayapura/Jakarta -- Three more people were reported dead on Thursday, following an attack by unknown assailants in the Papua regency of Paniai, three days ago, bringing the total number of dead to four, with two others missing and three others in the hospital.
The three newly identified victims, all construction workers at a new school, were Sonda, 23, who was shot in his back and left leg, Nunung, 25, who was shot in the chest and Kondo, 25, shot in the neck.
Previous reports said that Bangke, 32, was the only fatality in the attack, which occurred in Ugimba subdistrict, Paniai between Nabire and Enarotali, about 500 kilometers southwest of Jayapura, the capital of Papua.
Sr. Comr. Daud Sihombing, the spokesman of the Papua provincial police, said that the three people were earlier reported as missing. He added that they most likely died shortly after the incident, from whence they apparently fled with severe wounds. "Two of them were found dead, while the third died on his way to the hospital," Daud told reporters in Jayapura. The remains of the dead construction workers were dispatched to the nearby town of Nabire on Thursday for burial.
The incident happened at around 5 a.m. on Tuesday, when seven construction workers, along with their boss Yohannes, were sleeping in a partially built school building in Ugimba. They were reportedly being guarded by two police officers, Wardoyo and Hendrik Balalembang. As they slept, around 10 unidentified gunmen appeared, who the police have since alleged to be Papuan separatist rebels, and showered them with bullets, prompting the two police officers to fire back.
A fierce gun fight developed in the area and lasted for an intense five minutes. In addition to the four dead, Panggalo, Sulaeman and police officer Hendrik suffered severe injuries, while officer Wardoyo was the only person who left unharmed during the attack. Panggalo, Sulaeman and Hendrik are being treated at Nabire hospital.
Meanwhile, Yohannes, the director of CV Siola the contractor working on the school and one of his workers, Rangga, are still missing, apparently after fleeing the attack, and their condition is not known. From the spent bullet casings found at the scene, according to the police spokesperson, the weaponry used were Mauser rifles, M-16 rifles and FN Pistols, all of which were said to have been used in previous incidents attributed to Papuan rebels. Robbery, not politics, apparently seemed to be the main motive behind Tuesday's attack, as Daud said that all the food, which was being stored at the site, was taken.
Separately, Lt. Col. Gustav Agus Irianto, the chief of Jayawijaya district military command, said that military personnel were hunting down more suspected rebels, 10 of whom were shot dead on Wednesday by Indonesian military (TNI) personnel in the Jayawijaya subdistrict of Yalengga.
Contrary to a previous report, the Jayawijaya incident on Wednesday and the Paniai incident on Tuesday were not linked. Gustav said that the 10 dead men had been buried on Thursday somewhere in the Jayawijaya regency, ruling out the possibility of positive identification or autopsies.
Meanwhile, in Jakarta, chief of the TNI Gen. Endriartono Sutarto gave a thumbs up to the TNI members involved in the raid, saying that the TNI would continue to search for at least 30 remaining suspected rebels believed to be in that same area.
Radio Australia - November 6, 2003
In Indonesia it's been claimed 10 separatist rebels, including a local leader, have been killed by special Kopassus troops in a pre-dawn raid in Papua. The military says it's killed the leader of the local Free Papua Movement (OPM) Yustinus Murib, in an ambush along with nine of his supporters. But just 24 hours earlier, the rebel leader had called on the United Nations to protect Papuans from an ongoing assault by Indonesian troops.
Presenter/Interviewer: Tricia Fitzgerald
Speakers: Petras Tabuni, Free Papua Movement rebel leader; Yustinus Murib, Free Papua Movement rebel commander; Pastor Benny Giay, leading Papua human rights advocate.
Fitzgerald: Free Papua Movement rebel leader Petras Tabuni rallying his supporters in the highlands of Papua last month.
His voice and that of his fellow rebel commander Yustinus Murib, who the Indonesia military claims has been killed, were recorded and smuggled out of Papua and aired on SBS television's Dateline Program in Australia. Mr Murib called for foreign intervention to prevent further killings by the military.
Murib: There needs to be open dialogue with the people of West Papua in order to reach a peaceful agreement with the help of a neutral country and the United nations. We issue this message from the highest authority of West Papua on second of October 2003."
Fitzgerald: Yustinus Murib not only made that call he sent a signed letter to President Megawati Sukarnoputri, the Australian Government and the UN repeating his call for foreign assistance.
The military says it killed Murib on Wednesday just the day before his plea for outside help was broadcast. They say he and his followers were killed after being caught in an ambush in mountain country in Central Papua, where the military says they were preparing an attack on a local government ceremony.
The rebels known as the OPM have been fighting since the 1960's against what they say is Indonesia's occupation of their land. In 1963 Indonesia took over the province after a ballot by a group of tribal leaders. Petras Tabuni says the feelings of Papuans haven't changed since that time and they still want to seperate from Indonesia.
Tabuni: We want to leave Indonesia we dont want to be part of Indonesia ... that is the fundamental principle for Papuans. So from this moment on we ask the international community to see that this bow and this arrow are no match for Indonesians weapons.
Fitzgerald: The Papuan rebel rebel leadership says with the growth in strength of the Indonesian military, it now accepts the need for peaceful dialogue to solve the conflict. Commander Tabuni says many younger Papuans support peaceful protests against Jakarta's rule.
Tabuni: Why do younger Papuans hold peaceful demonstrations, to prove to the international community that the West Papuans are a civilised people who can stand beside other nations of the world ... to show we are no longer stone age cannibals despite what the Indonesians believe.
Fitzgerald: A senior churchman and one of Papua's leading human rights advocates, Benny Giay says Papuans are being overwhelmed by the influx of Indonesian military, and the continuing crackdowns. Pastor Giay says in the highlands thousands of villagers have been forced from their homes because of the military sweep that's been going on for months.
Giay: Many will be starving to death because of military operations which has destroyed not only their homes but also their gardens, their pigs, their chickens were also killed by the military.
Fitzgerald: Pastor Giay says like Aceh Jakarta regards Papuans as the enemy.
Giay: Papua and Aceh has been targetted by the military as regions where they had to send military and military presence is needed. Papuans has been treated as enemies that has to be destroyed.
Weekend Australian - November 8, 2003
Tim Johnston -- Indonesia may be gearing up for a new offensive against separatist rebels in the restive eastern province of Papua, observers believe. Analysts in Jakarta have warned that the killing of 10 suspected members of the Free Papua Organisation (OPM) this week could be the first shots in a renewed campaign.
"What we may be seeing in this operation is the stepping up of operations to go after the OPM in a way that is probably not unrelated to the military emergency in Aceh," said Sidney Jones of the International Crisis Group yesterday.
Indonesia's influential military, which had been forced to take a back seat since the fall of disgraced dictator Suharto five years ago, is once again in the ascendancy despite continuing questions over its human rights record.
The army won the political debate this week to have the military "emergency" in another restive province, Aceh, extended. More than 1000 people are believed to have been killed there in the past six months of emergency.
Papua has been relatively peaceful in recent months, but the military has been bringing in reinforcements. "It is as though we have been moving in the direction of a crackdown in Papua, but a much less visible one than in Aceh," Dr Jones said. The military declined to comment yesterday.
The OPM group killed on Wednesday included senior commander Justinus Murib. Pictures of his bloodied and shirtless corpse, supported by grinning soldiers, have been published widely in the Indonesian press. Indonesian analysts believe Murib was behind the attack on an army base in the town of Wamena in April in which two soldiers were killed and weapons stolen. The army says he was planning further raids.
The OPM is not the force it once was. Ill-armed and fractured along ethnic lines, it has had little recent military successes and parts of the organisation have made tentative efforts at beginning dialogue with Jakarta. "They hope dialogue is the way forward to a peaceful solution and the end of the human rights problem in Papua," Aloy Ranuarin, of the Papua-centred human rights organisation Elsham, said yesterday.
But their efforts have been futile. "I can't imagine Jakarta saying 'yes' to any negotiations because they are so much stronger than the OPM. The OPM does not constitute a real security threat," Ms Jones said.
The OPM has been fighting for independence since the former Dutch colony was annexed by Indonesia in 1963. The UN gave respectability to the shotgun marriage in 1969 with a so-called "Act of Free Choice", which critics say was anything but.
Thousands of people died in the ensuing attempts by the army to suppress revolt, but the situation seemed to be improving after Suharto's fall in 1998, when a number of influential Papuan leaders forswore violence and formed a negotiating bloc, the Papua Presidium Council.
Hopes for a peaceful solution received a possibly fatal blow in 2001 when the council's charismatic head, Theys Eluay, was murdered and his body dumped in a ravine. Seven members of the army's elite Kopassus unit have been jailed for their part in the murder, despite the post-conviction assertion by the head of the army, General Ryamizard Ryacudu, that they were "heroes".
Australian Associated Press - November 6, 2003
Rob Taylor, Jakarta -- Indonesian special forces troops have ambushed and killed 10 alleged separatists in Papua, including a top rebel leader, after they attacked a village in the latest round of independence-linked fighting.
About 50 soldiers from the elite Kopassus commandos and local troops ambushed suspected members of the Free Papua Movement (OPM) during a "sweeping operation" near Yalengga village, in the rugged mountains of central Papua province. Yustinus Murib, leader of a faction of the OPM, was killed in a second exchange after surviving rebels fled into the dense bush, Indonesia's local military commander Colonel Agus Mulyadi said.
The ambush, mounted during darkness yesterday morning, followed a tip-off that OPM guerrillas were planning an attack. Eight bodies were found after the initial firefight, along with weapons and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, while Murib was killed along with another rebel during a subsequent army search, Colonel Mulyadi said.
"They were going to attack the inauguration of the local mayor and according to documents we found, they were also going to attack the local parliament office and the local police warehouse." He said the weapons carried by the rebels, including three M16 machine guns and a handgun, were stolen during a raid on an Indonesian military store several months ago, led by Murib.
The latest firefight followed a weekend raid by suspected OPM guerrillas in which one person was shot dead and three others, including a policeman, were wounded.
The OPM has been fighting for independence in the province they call West Papua since the 1960s, when the then-Dutch colony was handed to Indonesia by the UN. In a bid to quell separatist sentiment, the Indonesian Government in 2001 introduced limited self-rule for the province, along with the other warring region of Aceh.
But tensions in Papua have been mounting over government plans to divide the province into three before next year's general election. The central government claims splitting Papua will improve administration, but critics claim it is a bid to control mounting separatist sentiment.
Reuters - November 5, 2003
Jakarta -- At least 12 people have been killed in clashes between security forces and separatist rebels in Indonesia's troubled Papua province, local media reported on Wednesday.
Eight rebels were killed and several were injured after troops raided a camp in the Wamena region on Wednesday morning, an army officer told El-Shinta radio.
"We launched the raid at 5 a.m and we confiscated weapons from them ... It is suspected that they had been planning to carry out attacks on a regency office and local military headquarters," Colonel Agus Mulyadi said. Security forces were not available for immediate comment.
In a separate incident, four people were killed and four others including a policeman were wounded after an armed group attacked a security post in the remote town of Enarotali on Tuesday, the official news agency Antara reported. It said those killed were civilians.
Resource-rich Papua, on the eastern end of this sprawling archipelago, is one of Indonesia's separatist hotspots where clashes between security forces and rebels break out periodically.
The Free Papua Movement has been waging armed resistance against Jakarta since Papua's forced incorporation into Indonesia in 1963.
A UN-run plebiscite in 1969 held among leaders of the local population resulted in a decision to join Indonesia, but the vote has been widely criticised as unfair.
Associated Press - November 4, 2003
Jakarta -- Gunmen apparently belonging to a separatist rebel group in Indonesia's Papua province attacked construction workers in a remote village, killing one of them and leaving five others missing, police said Tuesday.
One of two policemen guarding the workers at a school building was wounded by a gunshot during the pre-dawn attack early Monday in the district of Enarotali, in central Papua, said Brig. Gen. Tony Jakobus, deputy chief of the local police.
The area -- some 3,200 kilometers northeast of Jakarta -- has been the scene of separatist violence for more than three decades.
Speaking from his office in the provincial capital of Jayapura, Jakobus said he believed the five missing workers were being held captive. He identified the assailants, numbering up to 10 armed men, as a rebel group led by Titus Murib -- who also goes by the name Kelly Kwalik. There was no immediate way to contact the rebels in Papua.
On April 4, Kwalik and his guerrillas attacked a military post in Wamena, about 400 kilometers east of Enarotali, killing two soldiers and one villager and stealing several guns.
Indonesia occupied the former Dutch colony on the western side of Papua New Guinea in 1963. Its sovereignty over the region was formalized in 1969 through a UN-sponsored referendum. Since then, a small group of guerrillas have been fighting for independence. The mineral-rich Papua, formerly Irian Jaya, is home to one of the world's largest gold mines -- run by New Orleans-based Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc.
SBS Dateline - November 5, 2003
Pete Thomas: What footage will you be broadcasting?
Mark Davis: It's a rather extraordinary video that was sent to us last week from the Balian valley, from an OPM rally, which is documenting reports that have been coming out all this year from church groups, but of course no journalists are allowed in there at the moment.
It's documenting a military operation thats going on at the moment, cracking down on the independence movement, which had been "tolerated" more or less for the last couple of years but that period has come to an end very firmly. These accounts are the first eyewitness accounts of people being shot ... we don't know how many, some tens of them at least. There's villages being burnt down, there's reports of up to 5000 people hiding in the forest.
Pete Thomas: Is there any information about who's actually controlling these forces, are they paid security connected to mining companies?
Mark Davis: No, It's just conventional TNI ... the tape we have, this is a speech, a secret rally if you like, again calling for independence, but more importantly saying look we are being decimated, um we cannot fight, we don't have weapons, and it's a call to the international community and it comes with a letter addressed to Megawati, pleading for the troops to be withdrawn, pleading for the fighting to end, and it's also written to the Prime Minister of Australia and to the head of the UN, asking for international assistance in trying to broker talks ... So we're going to pass that letter on to Mega, we'll send it to John Howard, we'll send it Kofi Annan and we'll send this tape along with it.
Pete Thomas: It certainly sounds quite disturbing.
Mark Davis: There's no horrific footage. It's just literally a plea. No footage comes out of this place. This is the great untold story of our time and it is on our doorstep. No footage comes out of this place and so, in that great clichi, no picture no story and that's exactly what's been happening to the Papuans and the Indonesians have understood this very well and they've sealed this place off very effectively, and with very few people going in, no international agencies, certainly no reporters allowed in, generally tourists aren't allowed in ... nothing comes out of the place, so in that environment you can do whatever you like and that's exactly what's been happening.
Pete Thomas: I was looking at a comment from Senator Robert Hill on the issue and he said that West Papua was an integral part of the Indonesian republic, we've not changed that opinion and there's no reason to suggest that will in the future.
Mark Davis: Unlike east Timor which always had Portugal with an ongoing interest, West Papua interests nobody, nobody has an interest there. They have no sponsor. There's no one that will support them internationally ... This place is unspeakable, this place is the full horror story. I've covered it for many years, it's as bad as you can imagine, it is the nightmare of, it's the place of nightmares and it's not sustainable ultimately and it's not sustainable for any Australian politician to support Indonesian action there.
| Government & politics |
Jakarta Post - November 5, 2003
Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jakarta -- In a show of distrust of their current House of Representatives legislators, a large group of Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) rank and file members have proposed new names for the legislative candidates for the 2004 election.
PDI Perjuangan secretary general Soetjipto said on Tuesday that around 50 percent of the names proposed by the party's regency branches from across the country were new.
"Many of our branches have complained of the lack of communication and support from their representatives at the House. Smarting from the experience, they've decided to back new candidates," Soetjipto said after the party's weekly meeting led by chairperson Megawati Soekarnoputri.
He said most regency branches considered the current legislators to be failures when it came doing anything for their constituents or fighting for their interests after their election.
"We also will withhold candidates who are not supported not by the people in their respective areas. It does raise questions, however, that they enjoy support in other areas," a seemingly puzzled Soetjipto added.
The party's deputy secretary general Pramono Anung Wibowo said the list of candidates would be finalized during a national meeting here on November 19, with the roster to be filled in numerical order.
PDI Perjuangan has suffered decreasing popularity since Megawati was appointed President in July 2001 after Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid was ousted by his political opponents. The loss of huge numbers of supporters, according to analysts was due to her and the party's perceived failure to fulfill their reform movement promises.
The party's internal research agency earlier disclosed that the party's popularity was radically slashed by nearly 50 percent, saying that of the 35 percent of the total who voted for the party in 1999, only around 20 percent are likely to cast their votes for the party in 2004.
Many other surveys conducted by various research agencies recently also drew similar conclusions, that PDI Perjuangan had lost about 80 percent of the public's trust.
Pramono dismissed the worries, saying the party would gain confidence as the list of candidates would include several prominent names.
Soetjipto further disclosed in the press conference that the central executive board of the party had threatened to dismiss a number of the party's legislators from the House -- those that continue to be considered "defiant" in their non-conformist response to the party's orders.
"We will dismiss them, at least from their position at the House, if they continue this defiance of party instructions," Soetjipto said, refused to mention the names of the independent-minded legislators.
A source from within the party, however, disclosed that the legislators in question had been reprimanded twice by the central executive board, and one was Haryanto Taslam, and the others possibly Meliono Soewondo and/or Arifin Panigoro.
Haryanto, Meliono and several legislators have been labeled as defiant members because they have had the courage to criticize Megawati in public and the audacity to make their own decisions on House votes, often in direct opposition to the executive board.
Arifin, who still holds the title of deputy chairman of the party, seems to have had a major falling out with the party's top brass, marked by his absence from party meetings over the last seven months and last week's flat refusal to meet Megawati after she had summoned him. Soetjipto said that the party would no longer tolerate such defiance, which is considered disloyal and that dismissals would be in order straightaway. "The dismissal will be decided soon," Soetjipto asserted.
| 2004 elections |
Straits Times - November 7, 2003
Derwin Pereira, Jakarta -- The betting game is on: Who will be Ms Megawati Sukarnoputri's running mate in the 2004 presidential election? Clearly in recent months, the incumbent's choices have narrowed down to three: security czar Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Muslim moderate leader Hasyim Muzadi and possibly a leading Golkar figure.
Her preference, her aides disclosed, is to team up with the retired army general or the leader of the 40- million-strong Nadhlatul Ulama (NU).
But realpolitik and Golkar's rising fortunes might mean that she may have to join forces with the one-time juggernaut of the Suharto regime even if she appears reluctant to do so nine months before the election.
With about 120 million votes to be cast in the polls, a winner would need at least 60 million votes to clinch the presidency.
Ms Megawati's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) and Golkar have reason to be confident, but each of them would still need to ally itself with another strong party or alliance to push its sponsored tickets first past the post.
Golkar is the biggest threat to the PDI-P given its grassroots reach and well-oiled infrastructure. But it also represents the most natural ally for Ms Megawati's party.
Both parties represent the political mainstream and have the most acceptable ideological platform -- secular nationalists -- for the majority of Indonesians. A coalition between PDI-P and Golkar, according to some observers, would be an "irrepressible force" at the presidential ballot box.
Ms Megawati's game plan initially was to forge an alliance with one of Golkar's leading executives, the Coordinating Minister for Welfare Jusuf Kalla.
But his poor showing at the preliminary Golkar convention last month has paved the way for others such as chairman Akbar Tandjung and retired general Wiranto to take the lead in clinching the party's presidential ticket.
Two of these political figures present the biggest threat to Ms Megawati -- and are unlikely to be coaxed easily into accepting the No. 2 position, especially if Golkar does well in the parliamentary election in April -- unless there is some form of deal making.
Mr Akbar, who is also the Parliamentary Speaker, looks more inclined to cave in to the palace, especially with the Supreme Court deliberating his appeal against corruption charges.
Mr Wiranto and the other Golkar candidates have their own plans. The bottom line is that Ms Megawati will never want to accept any other arrangement other than being the next president.
This has forced her to keep her options open in courting others outside the political circuit to support her election bid. One of them is Mr Susilo, a Cabinet minister with broad exposure but no proven grassroots political support.
Ms Megawati has indicated privately to close aides that he is her preferred choice because he is loyal "and not prone to internal politicking".
Oozing diplomatic charm and always dressed in executive suits, Mr Susilo is adept at projecting nationalist causes. The President sees his military background as a crucial asset in dealing with problems of national security. But he does not have a significant political base or party, though there are indications that he might quit his ministerial post next month to join one. Even then, there is little guarantee that he could bring in 10 to 20 million votes more for Ms Megawati.
That leaves the President with a third option: the NU's Hasyim Muzadi. By playing the Islamic card, Ms Megawati is certain to cover the electoral ground in Indonesia. Indeed, her husband Taufik Kiemas is trying his level best to spread the patronage network to the NU home base in East Java, with the hope of winning their support.
But the baggage of toppling Mr Abdurrahman Wahid in 2000 will make it hard for Ms Megawati and the PDI-P to cultivate the Muslim ground. It is still debatable whether Mr Hasyim would want to back her. For now at least, the bets are on Golkar.
| Corruption/collusion/nepotism |
Associated Press - November 5, 2003
Jakarta -- Indonesian lawmakers are investigating a claim that the son of President Megawati Sukarnoputri is part of a real estate scam involving state land -- an allegation that has surfaced as she prepares for election next year.
The lawmakers, most of them opposition legislators, alleged yesterday that Mr Muhammad Rizki Pratama won a contract to build luxury apartments and a shopping centre on land in Jakarta which had been used as a fairground, without making a public tender required by law.
They said Mr Rizki made the purchase at below market value because of his status as the President's son, possibly causing losses to the state. "I believe this is unethical. Megawati broke her promise to ban her family from doing business," said Mr Effendi Choirie, the head of the legislative probe.
The probe is being conducted by a committee of Parliament represented by many parties, including Ms Megawati's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P).
Neither Mr Rizki, the President's 34-year-old son by her first marriage, nor his representatives could be reached yesterday to respond to the accusations.
Mr Choirie said his team hopes to question Mr Rizki, his two partners, and the fairground's management board next week about the deal, which is allegedly backed by a bank warranty worth US$700 million.
PDI-P legislator Tjahlo Kumolo denied Mr Rizki took part in the tender, the Rakyat Merdeka newspaper reported yesterday.
The accusations could hurt Ms Megawati's political prospects and raise further doubts about her already faltering anti-corruption drive.
| Human rights/law |
Jakarta Post - November 5, 2003
Kurniawan Hari, Jakarta -- The Constitutional Court on Tuesday held its first session to hear lawyers of groups of people seeking a legal review of three laws: On electricity, on oil and gas, and on the government debt instrument.
The Constitutional Court, formally set up on August 16, is directed by the Constitution to conduct judicial reviews and settle cases where the president is considered to have violated the law.
Presiding judge Jimly Asshidiqie said people seeking judicial review are given 14 days to complete the necessary documents. The courtroom is temporarily situated at the House of Representatives (DPR) building here.
Preliminary trials are held to give the people and their lawyers more time to complete the necessary documents.
The first trial of the Constitutional Court attracted among others constitutional law experts Harun Alrasyid and Satya Arinanto, apart from member of the Civil Servants' Wealth Audit Commission (KPKPN) Sukoco.
The first session heard lawyer Jhonson Panjaitan who represented a group of people seeking legal review of the electricity law.
Panjaitan said that Law No. 20/2002 on electricity contradicted Article 33 of the Constitution which says that all forms of production that benefit the public must be controlled by the state, including electricity. He said that the law has encouraged the private sector to invest in electricity companies.
The procession started when the protocol asked the audience to stand up while the panel of nine judges entered the courtroom in red attire.
Jimly was accompanied by deputy chief judge Laica Marzuki and seven members HAS Natabaya, Haryono, I Dewa Gede Palguna, Mukhtie Fajar, Achmad Roestandi, Soedarsono, and M. Siahaan.
The electricity law is among 14 laws listed for judicial review, which was taken over by the Constitutional Court from the Supreme Court on October 15.
Apart from laws on oil and gas and on the government debt instrument, Constitutional Court Acting Secretary General Janedjri M. Ghaffar said that others include the laws on the Supreme Court, broadcasting and the law on the Commission for Corruption Eradication (KPTPK).
Still more are the laws on the general elections, political parties, regional autonomy and the law on the status and composition of the House of Representatives (DPR), the Regional Representatives Council (DPD) and the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR).
| Informal sector/urban poor |
Agence France Presse - November 5, 2003
Geneva -- Indonesia, Guatemala and Serbia-Montenegro won an award Wednesday for failing to address a massive problem of homelessness and slums, while Scotland was praised for its "rare" protection of the right to housing, an advocacy group said.
The Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) launched the annual Housing Rights Awards last year to focus attention on the plight of more than one billion people worldwide who it said live in slums and some 100 million people who are homeless on any given night.
"Although few governments have done enough to enforce the widely-recognised right to housing, this year Indonesia, Guatemala and Serbia-Montenegro stand out for their appalling disregard for housing rights," said COHRE's executive director, Scott Leckie. The group chose Indonesia from a short list of about 15 countries because, it alleged, the government had allowed the violent eviction of people from cities and was guilty of housing-related crimes in the provinces of Aceh and Papua.
Guatemala was given the Housing Rights Violator Award because it had ignored various rights to housing and land, according to COHRE.
And Serbia-Montenegro "continues to discriminate severely against the Roma, many of whom live in conditions far worse than many of the most horrendous slums found in the developing world," Leckie said in a statement.
Last year 10 countries won the dishonourable title, including the United States, and Leckie hoped some had been shamed into tidying up their act.
| Environment |
Jakarta Post - November 5, 2003
Jakarta/Medan -- Government officials have joined environmental activists in blaming inconsistent forest management and poor law enforcement as the main causes of rampant deforestation that resulted in the flash flood which killed at least 103 people on Sunday. Hundreds are missing following the flood in Langkat regency, North Sumatra.
"Yes. It's due to unprofessional management. We're not disciplined," Vice President Hamzah Haz said on Tuesday, commenting on the disaster. Hamzah admitted that the blame lay not only with the forestry sector but also the mining sector, both of which harm the ecosystem. Hamzah said that the authorities must not hesitate to take harsh action against illegal logging, which plays a major role in the rampant deforestation in Sumatra.
Citing Langkat administration reports, Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Jusuf Kalla said that the flash flood in Langkat, located on the slopes of the Mount Leuser National Park (TNGL), was partly due to rampant illegal logging there. "The [Langkat] regent reported that the flash flood also swept up logs that resulted in the deaths of scores of people," he told reporters.
Apart from rampant deforestation, the floods were also said to be triggered by heavy rains from 10 p.m on Sunday until 1 a.m. on Monday. Suparwi, the Medan Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG), revealed that his office recorded 66 millimeters of rainfall on Sunday, two mm on Monday and nine mm on Tuesday. The average monthly rainfall in the area is 238 mm.
The agency had earlier warned of possible heavy rains at the beginning of the rainy season, which started at the end of October. The Langkat administration said that the Mount Leuser National Park had lost some 40,000 hectares of its total of 788,000 hectares of land.
However, environmental organizations have estimated that the park has lost some 22 percent, or 170 hectares of its land, due to illegal logging and illegal conversion of the park land into farmlands. However the forestry ministry blamed the illegal development of houses on riverbanks as the source of problems causing the flash flood.
Koes Saparjadi, the Director General of Nature and Forest Conservation, said that the Landsat satellite image revealed that forest around the site where the disaster occurred was still in a good condition.
He concluded that the flash flood occurred because the upper side of the Bahorok river, one of five that flows through the regency, was possibly clogged up by soil due to the landslide. "The conclusion followed reports that the flood swept up trees [not logs], so it was not [the result of illegal logging]," Koes was quoted by Antara as saying.
Koes claimed that his ministry had asked the North Sumatra administration to remove illegal settlers from the Bahorok riverbank in 1998, however, several residents expressed opposition. He promised that his ministry would find out whether the disaster was purely a natural disaster or otherwise.
Koes also announced that his ministry has asked the Langkat administration to close the Bukit Lawang resort in Langkat temporarily in a bid to prevent more casualties.
The disaster in the resort area is not the first of its kind in the country in the last couple of years. At least 26 people died when a flash flood and mudslide buried a hot springs resort, located around the forests of state-owned Perhutani, in Pacet, Mojokerto in East Java last December. Authorities had also cited illegal logging as the possible cause of the disaster.
Non-governmental organizations have repeatedly asked the government to be serious in clamping down on illegal logging.
Indonesia has lost more than 75 percent of its forests over the past few decades, leaving only 60 million hectares today. In the past five years, some 43 million hectares of Indonesia's forests, or the equivalent of more than half of Kalimantan has been damaged.
The World Bank predicts that if the current rapid pace of deforestation continues, Indonesia could lose Sumatra's forests in 2005, with Kalimantan to follow five years later.
The Indonesian Forum on the Environment (Walhi) raised the possibility of the role of a controversial road project in the disaster. The plan to connect Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam to North Sumatra by road, known as Ladia Galaska, includes the clearing of land in some parts of the Mount Leuser National Park. "The project has increased illegal logging activities. It is true that the initial project is in Aceh, but we must remember that the ecosystem is like a net. If some parts are harmed, it would affect other parts," Walhi director Longgena Ginting said.
Earlier, the Leuser Management Unit had warned that the project could damage between 200 square kilometers to 400 square kilometers of forest in the park.
Separately, the Indonesia Center for Environmental Law (ICEL) called on the central government to help local administrations to tackle illegal logging and illegal conversion of protected forests into commercial areas.
Agence France Presse - November 5, 2003
Jakarta -- Indonesia's environment minister on Wednesday branded illegal loggers as terrorists after a flood disaster blamed on tree-felling killed an estimated 190 people in North Sumatra.
Nabiel Makarim criticised the army and police for involvement in the practice, which is rampant across much of the huge archipelago.
"I insist that based on the criteria in the anti-terrorist law the fact is, destruction of the environment such as illegal logging can be categorised as terrorism," Makarim told reporters.
"The consequences caused by the destruction of the environment like floods and landslides are just as dangerous as the consequences of a bomb," the minister said.
Makarim, despite his remarks, did not say that illegal loggers should be charged under the anti-terror law pased in the wake of the Bali attack.
Police, troops and civilian volunteers had found 87 bodies while about 100 others were still missing, said rescue official Johnny Sitorus. Officials say there is little hope of finding the missing alive.
Makarim said the environment ministry is trying to prosecute 48 environmental cases, particularly cases of illegal logging, but it is not easy because the judiciary is corrupt.
"It is difficult to combat illegal logging because we must face financial backers and their shameless protectors both from the Indonesian armed forces and police, and from other government agencies," he said, after discussing the problem with President Megawati Sukarnoputri.
Makarim said natural disasters in Indonesia have tended to increase over the last three or four years. "This is firmly connected with an extraordinary amount of illegal logging."
| Islam/religion |
Asia Times - November 5, 2003
Tony Sitathan, Jakarta -- Idris Kemal, a senior security guard at the famous 1001 Nightclub in the Kota district of West Jakarta, popularly known as Chinatown, has been having restless evenings of late. He listens intently to the evening prayer call followed by the rolling of drums from a mosque nearby symbolizing the end of the fasting day for Ramadan. He starts smoking his Djarum Kretek and signals to his subordinates to have their meal, after the breaking of the day-long fast.
Idris and his fellow security personnel have been briefed by the nightclub owner to keep a watchful eye on the premises, a well- known entertainment complex housing a massage center, karaoke cum disco and a casino. Although, as a sign of respect for Ramadan, it will remain closed until the end of the holy fasting month, there can be no assurance that it will not fall victim to a sudden outbreak of violence.
Ramadan is a month-long fast for Muslims to show repentance for their sins and ask God for forgiveness. It is considered a personal jihad (holy war) for cleansing the body as well as the soul from everyday worldly pleasures. Idris Kemal, however, was worried about a jihad of another kind. "We have to be ready and prepared for any hostile organized groups that will attack our premises. We have a duty to protect and repel any possible attacks from any religious-minded groups, even if it means going against fellow Muslims," he said.
In the past, the Ramadan period in Indonesia has been a hunting ground for several paramilitary-style Islamic groups that try to enforce the Ramadan spirit over nightclubs, public places of entertainment, massage parlors, gaming centers and vice dens. Even restaurants and dining places have been targets of mob attacks during the Ramadan period, causing local residents and tourists alike to fear frequenting these places.
"Two years ago our restaurant, Pasir Putih Seafood Market Grill and Bar in Kemang, was a target for attacks from the Front Pembela Islam [FPI]," recalled a Pasir Puthi assistant food and beverage manager. "There was no real reason for the attack, as we hold only a live band for entertaining our customers and offer food and drinks like any other seafood restaurant. There is hardly even any space for dancing. The damage cost us hundreds of millions of rupiah, and we closed our premises for over three months."
Along the same stretch of road in Kemang lies the Salsa Club, considered the Latin American heartbeat of Jakarta. It has a restaurant, a bar and a place to dance salsa. Patrons can learn the fancy footwork of the salsa from in-house teachers. It's a far cry from the likes of Raja Mas Disco or Stadium Nightclub in West Jakarta, where night revelers have been known to consume boutique drugs and engage in hedonistic practices ranging from personal lap dances to female strippers. But even the Salsa Club has been victimized by mob attacks. The Salsa Club was closed for several months. Now it has shorter opening hours and has considered not offering liquor on its premises during Ramadan. As an added security precaution it has managed to get a police patrol car to be somewhat permanently stationed outside its premises. "Perhaps that would be a good deterrence to people thinking of attacking us," said Daniel, a bouncer and security guard who was formerly a corporal in the Indonesian Armed Forces (TNI).
Radical Islamic groups are found throughout Indonesia, but they seem to be particularly active during Ramadan. Laskar Jihad (Holy War Legion) was active in central Sulawesi and Ambon before it was outlawed by the government. Ja'far Umar Thalib, its leader, was arrested over an incident in Ambon and is in police custody expecting a trial soon.
Another militia group calling itself the Taliban Brigade, though it has nothing to do in reality with the Taliban in Afghanistan, has been terrorizing the province of Tasikmalaya, about 150 kilometers south of Jakarta. It has been fighting for Islamic Shariah laws to be imposed on the local community. Indonesia, being a secular state, has recognized the Panca Sila as the official state ideology, which promises all major faiths equal representation in the country, unlike Shariah, which is based on Islamic laws.
Yet another shadowy group is the Hizbulloh Front, which has an agenda similar to the FPI's. Dressed in ninja-like all-black clothing, this group has been seen countering anti-military and pro-government demonstrations.
However, the most vocal of these organizations is the FPI. It was once part of a government-sponsored civilian security force known as PAM Swakarsa. This unit was formed to fight against student demonstrators opposed to the administration of former president B J Habibie and the military's role in politics. PAM Swakarsa had a special charter at that time to prevent pro-democracy activists from marching to parliament to voice their aspirations.
"The Front Pembela Islam has been more active of late and is seen as a legitimate front for establishing a Shariah state in Indonesia and has been particularly active during the Ramadan period," said a high-ranking member of the Armed Forces Strategic Intelligence Agency (BAIS), which plays a national role in repressing internal security threats and works closely with paramilitary forces. "I wouldn't go too far to say that it is a breeding ground of future anarchists and terrorists."
The FPI was formerly led by a charismatic cleric named Habib Rizieq. Last year after a raid in Jakarta, a warrant for his arrest was issued by the Jakarta police. Despite overt Islamic leanings, many of its members are classified as thugs and preman or street gangsters. Last year when they attacked a pub in Kemang, they not only vandalized the premises but stole cash and wallets from patrons and molested several female patrons.
However, it is not the mindless destruction of public property or the attacks on personal property that cause fear among working- class Indonesians. The fear of bodily harm is paramount for those working in the prostitution and massage businesses. Several of them say they have become prime targets for those involved in the anti-prostitution sweep across Jakarta, which not only threatens their means of livelihood but their personal well-being as well.
Shinta Dewi works in Kartika Chandra, a massage parlor in the heart of Kota. She was afraid to turn up to work during the first two days of Ramadan. "I was afraid that there would be personal attacks from Islamic youth organizations," she said in Bahasa Indonesia, the country's official Malay dialect. "So now we work during the morning hours and leave before midnight. I just don't want to take any chances, especially since I have two little children who depend on me."
When asked why she didn't ask the police for protection, she smiled and said she would rather trust the street hoodlums than the police for her personal safety.
| Military ties |
Far Eastern Economic Review - November 6, 2003
John McBeth, Singapore -- The US is funding, training and arming specially screened Indonesian policemen in a new pilot program that will ultimately leave Indonesia with a self- contained, 400-strong counterterrorism unit capable of tackling everything from bomb investigations and terrorist acts to hostage-taking and armed assaults.
When fully operational in 2005, it will be able to respond swiftly to incidents throughout the archipelago, reports the latest edition of the Far Eastern Economic Review published Thursday. The US expects that the new force, dubbed Detachment 88, will significantly strengthen the police's ability to shoulder most of the burden in the war against terrorism in Indonesia.
Western military experts say, however, that it may take several years before it can match the capabilities of Indonesia's 4,500- strong military special forces, which have traditionally been responsible for counterterrorism operations. The police already have a core of US-trained hostage negotiators but, as one Western military officer points out, "they really aren't yet capable of doing high-level tasks."
In addition to training by the US State Department's diplomatic security service and retired agents from the US Secret Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency, the initial $16 million in funding for the new police unit is providing state-of-the-art communications equipment, night-vision gear, technical support and weaponry, including Heckler and Koch MP5 submachine guns and Remington 700 sniper rifles, Washington officials say. The officials say that if Detachment 88 builds on the successes the police have enjoyed so far in rounding up the terrorists responsible for deadly bombings in Bali and Jakarta over the past 13 months, the US is also likely to supply the unit with helicopters and C-130 transport aircraft. "If everything works out well, we are prepared to look at that," one senior US
So far the Americans have graduated three 10-man police investigation teams, three eight-man tactical response units and three five-man bomb squads in a program that will effectively merge three police departments into one. Security experts familiar with Indonesian police capabilities expect most of the instruction on bomb disposal will center around improvised explosive devices. All recruits to the counterterrorism force are vetted to ensure that they have clean human-rights records and haven't served in the former Indonesian territory of East Timor. Washington has had to focus on the police because of the continuing congressional constraints on the military-to-military relationship with Jakarta dating back to a 1991 massacre of civilians in East Timor by Indonesian troops. The Americans, moreover, believe the police should be responsible for internal security in Indonesia.
But under a new $17 million US Defense Department program, more than 100 Indonesian military officers are taking up "counter- terrorist fellowships," which cover courses ranging from combat skills to finance management. US officials openly acknowledge that the fellowships are a politically palatable way to allow Indonesia's renewed participation in the Pentagon's International Military Education and Training programme.
New image, new responsibility
It was only three years ago that the police separated from the military chain of command, signaling the start of a move aimed at reforming and redirecting the focus of a 196,000-member force tainted by corruption and human-rights abuses. The US
Justice Department is spending $40 million on a project to make the police more responsive to Indonesia's new democratic environment. Parliamentary decrees issued in 2000 stipulated that internal security was the responsibility of the police. Events since then, however, have shown that it is still not up to the task of putting a lid on sectarian violence that has wracked the country since the fall of President Suharto in mid-1998. Moreover, last year's Defense White Paper made it clear that the 297,000-strong military still sees a role for itself in preserving internal security. Political Coordinating Minister Bambang Yudhoyono is still working out who will take the lead role in dealing with scenarios such as hostage-taking and aircraft hijacking that require armed intervention by highly- trained operators.
On a more mundane level, the police's decision to call their counterterrorism unit Detachment 88 was made when the Americans first began offering Indonesia anti-terrorist assistance, or ATA as it is more commonly referred to. The Indonesians mistook the acronym and the way it was pronounced for 88. "Once we got all that cleared up," explains US Ambassador Ralph Boyce, "we all got together and decided to call it 88 anyway."
| Economy & investment |
Asia Times - November 6, 2003
Bill Guerin, Jakarta -- Having consistently failed to reach its privatization targets, and battered once again by a bank lending scandal, the Indonesian government is seeking to sell off yet another of its crown jewels -- a major chunk of the state-owned gas distribution and marketing company PT Perusahaan Gas Negara (PGN).
The sale is expected to raise 1.5 trillion to 2 trillion rupiah from divestment of 30 percent of the company. The government will keep a minimum 51 percent for the medium term. But just as the government was getting brave enough to restart its sputtering privatization sales, it was rocked by a lending scandal at Bank Negara Indonesia (BNI), which has resulted in the arrest of two senior executives in connection with US$200 million worth of allegedly spurious letters of credit and raised the suspicions of multinational investors, who quite rightly remain dubious of the books of any Indonesian company, governmental or not.
Unloading state-owned companies, including PGN and BNI, is vital to plugging a ballooning state deficit that, coupled with rising expenditures, is expected to widen to an estimated 2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), or 5.1 trillion rupiah.
The government's failure to divest three state companies -- pharmaceutical companies Kimia Farma and Indofarma, and airport operator PT Angkasa Pura II -- earlier this year forced government planners to revise downward their privatization target to 6.1 trillion rupiah. However, the government said on Tuesday that it could now bring in around 8 trillion rupiah ($945 million) in privatization proceeds this year.
Although the PGN divestment had been planned for this month, it will now take place in December after several would-be strategic investors were said to have been unhappy with an Arthur Andersen audit of the company's 2001 finances. Ernst and Young crunched the numbers again and filed a report on Monday with the Financial Markets Supervisory Agency (Bapepam).
ABN AMRO Rothschild, Credit Suisse First Boston and Danareksa Sekuritas are expected to kick off the domestic road show on November 10, taking it international on November 12. PGN's dominant market position, established network coverage and customer base, good track record and experienced management are its strong points.
The company sells 91 percent of Indonesia's domestic gas. Its major suppliers have all signed 20-year contracts with take-or- pay clauses. Some 18 percent of PGN's revenue in 2002 came from charges the suppliers pay to run gas through PGN's network.
Long-term transmission contracts, which account for some 95 percent of PGN's total gas supply, generate stable revenue and cash flow. Approximately 50 percent of the projected operating profits over the next three years will come from its 60 percent- owned subsidiary PT Transportasi Gas Indonesia (TGI). PGN has some 2,547 kilometers of gas pipelines serving six separate distribution networks via three transmission pipelines but it badly needs funds to pay for several pipeline projects in the works.
However, the company's revenues and growth prospects are linked to the success of the economy in general. In 2002, for example, 82 percent of its revenue came from end-user sales to industrial companies, whose demand is directly linked to GDP.
Moody's Investors Service, which rated PGN higher than the government itself earlier in the year, explained the apparent anomaly away by the fact that all of PGN's current outstanding debts are soft loans from international credit agencies that were lent to PGN by the government and are not subject to cross- default on the government's other debt obligations.
Demand for gas has outstripped supply for the last two years, and it is imperative to bring more gas fields on line to keep pace. PGN wants the government to up the divestment to 39 percent to ensure sufficient funds for financing new gas pipeline projects in Java and Sumatra. A major expansion program aimed at meeting growing demand will be funded mainly by debt, with the rest from operating cash flow.
PGN expects to develop an East Java-West Java pipeline and a 1000-kilometer East Kalimantan- East Java pipeline in 2005. Its viability has been questioned, given that the gas price in Java is uncompetitive compared with that of LNG (liquefied natural gas). Japan is buying LNG at well above $3 per million BTU (British thermal units), but PLN's ceiling price for buying gas is $3 across the country.
Given the extra costs for transporting their gas from East Kalimantan or Sumatra, producers in East Kalimantan may well prefer to sell their gas for LNG production in Bontang than send it to Java via a pipeline.
PGN has plans for two gas-receiving terminals in Java, expected to be completed by 2007, to receive LNG from Papua and South Sulawesi.
"We might seek loans worth $1.4 billion to finance the two projects. But the numbers will become less and less if a strategic investor comes in," said PGN's president director, Washington Simanjuntak.
A 399-kilometer South Sumatra-West Java transmission pipeline project, linking Grissik to Jakarta via Pagardewa in South Sumatra and Cilegon in West Java, expected to be completed in 2006, will feed gas from South Sumatra to the industrial heartland of West Java. Other planned projects in the offing are a pipeline for the transmission of gas from Sumatra to Malaysia's west coast and a 380-kilometer pipeline from Duri to Belawan, North Sumatra.
Natural gas is already piped into Singapore from gas fields in West Natuna in the South China Sea through a 640-kilometer pipeline, which was launched two years ago. However, Sumatra is projected to become the main source of gas for the Trans-ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Gas Pipeline Project.
PGN's pride and joy, the Interstate Gas Transmission project, a $420 million natural gas pipeline deal between PGN and Singaporean gas utility, Power Gas Ltd, was completed in August.
Stretching 470 kilometers from Grissik in South Sumatra to Singapore's Sakra Island via Sakernan in Jambi and Batam Island, the pipeline has 229 kilometers of pipeline onshore and the is rest underwater.
The pipeline is part of a network linking gas fields in South Sumatra with Singapore, via Batam, and to crude oil fields in Duri, Riau, operated by PT Caltex Pacific Indonesia. It is also an integral part of a master plan to build the Indonesian Integrated Transmission Pipeline (PTGI), aimed at meeting the demand for gas across the country.
The network feeds 150 million standard cubic feet per day of gas from fields operated by ConocoPhillips and PetroChina in Sumatra to Power Gas, with the volume ramped up annually, in a 22-year supply contract. Singapore will buy an estimated $9 billion in natural gas over the contract term, and the project has given jobs to some 2,500 Indonesian workers.
This was the first venture by the private sector into the gas transportation sector following "de- monopolization" through the 2001 Oil and Gas Law, and heralded in similar forays to the sector.
Eighty percent of the expected 100 million cubic feet of gas a day will be sold to the state electricity company PLN, which is to pipe the fuel to power stations in West Java. The field, which has gas reserves of about 300 billion cubic feet, is expected to begin production in 2005.
PGN's solid domestic customer base consists of more than 650 large industrial users. More than 70 percent of these operate in three sectors -- chemical and glass and ceramic manufacturers as well as metal producers. However, unlike large scale users in the US, for example, most of these industrial users could easily switch fuel from gas to oil if the balance moved back in the latter's favor.
Clean-air rules, applied rigorously in the West, do not yet exist in Indonesia and thus there is no compelling reason to use natural gas other than a price advantage. Encouraged by the earlier removal of fuel oil subsidies, end users were being persuaded to switch to natural gas, thus fueling the continuing growth in demand for gas.
Notwithstanding the feathers in its cap, PGN's inherent weakness is the mismatch of its short- term take-or-pay end user contracts, which have less than two years to run, against the long-term take-or-pay supply contracts. PGN could be exposed to the risk of non-renewal of sales contracts upon maturity, particularly if the government fails to maintain a stable operating environment and industry structure for the gas industry.
Despite its vast reserves, Indonesia's domestic gas sector remains grossly underdeveloped compared to its neighbors. Gas reserves are estimated at 150 trillion cubic feet, and contracts have been signed for only 30 trillion feet. Gas has been developed as a foreign exchange earner from exports while the domestic market, where investment in pipelines and other enabling infrastructure was minimal, has been largely neglected.
The government has now said that a pillar of its fuel diversification policy would be to price gas competitively, particularly for power generation.
Downstream oil and gas regulator, BPH Migas, established in May this year is mandated to set the eagerly awaited consumer prices and tariffs for network access.
Amid rising demand from industrial plants in Java, the government has said it would keep gas prices low to create a multiplier effect in the overall economy, by creating more employment in the petrochemical industry and providing farmers with cheaper fertilizer to boost agricultural production. But the joker in the pack may be the political considerations.
Fuel subsidies have been progressively reduced and were due to be scrapped next year, but only last week legislators and the government agreed to allocate a bigger slice of the budget pie -- Rp14.5 trillion ($1.73 billion) -- for subsidies in next year's state budget.
"Fuel subsidies are up because oil prices have changed," Director General of Oil and Natural Gas, Iin Arifin Takhyan said.
However, as Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Purnomo Yusgiantoro warned, ending subsidies in an election year would be difficult because of the political situation in the country.