Indonesia’s dirty war of repression in Aceh

Indonesia’s dirty war of repression in Aceh
By John Roberts
11 August 2003

At the end of July, a delegation from the Indonesian upper house of parliament (MPR) visited the war-torn province of Aceh in northern Sumatra and proclaimed the huge military offensive against the separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM), begun on May 19, a success.

Deputy Speaker Soetardjo Soerjogoeritno, leader of the 15-member delegation, based his conclusion on the number of houses flying the red- and-white national flag and the number of local Acehnese who have taken loyalty oaths to the Indonesian state. In fact, these “successes” are the product of a massive campaign of repression being conducted by more than 30,000 troops, backed by 13,000 police, armoured vehicles, warplanes and artillery.

President Megawati Sukarnoputri has proclaimed a state of emergency throughout the province, allowing authorities to impose a battery of anti- democratic measures, including tough censorship provisions. Journalists are required to attend courses run by the armed forces (TNI) and then work with military units. Foreigners have been banned from the province. But from the little independent reporting of the war available, a very different picture emerges from that painted by the Jakarta politicians.

A report in the Jakarta Post in early July described a “loyalty ceremony” attended by 12,000 people from 54 villages in the Kuta Baro district of the Aceh Besar regency. It noted that most of those taking part were elderly or sick, as younger people had left, either to join the insurgents or out of fear of being accused by the army of being “GAM sympathisers”.

A 30-year-old injured man explained that martial law authorities had “asked” the villagers to attend three days earlier, after flooding the area with troops and armoured vehicles. “As civilians, we had to accept the invitation because if we rejected it, we would be labeled GAM supporters,” he told the newspaper. “Honestly, most people have been living in fear since they are physically powerless, but nevertheless have strong opinions on independence and on the necessity of a self- determination referendum for the province.”

A report published by the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG) on July 23, entitled “Aceh: How not to win hearts and minds,” outlined the measures being used by the military to intimidate the entire population and purge the provincial administration. These include: (...)

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http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/aug2003/aceh-a11.shtml

I wanted to include in a couple of the "hearts and
minds" measures but it was already at 6 paragraphs..
Campaigns like this--and there are no shortages of
them in many places--,should rather be renamed to the
"Resistance Mass-Recruitment Program".

Not just a mess, but a big, smouldering, festering, mess. Of course it has oil (as every other smouldering, festering mess on this planet does), it is the largest Islamic country in the world, and it is a chaotic hodge-podge of ethnic groups heaped on top of one another exacerbated by land scarcity (habitable land and arable land, that is) and disasterous resettlement policies from prior central governments who didn't care about Indonesia's peripheral minorities.

Once you take all that in, then you move on to considering that the Indonesian government only got around to grudgingly admitting that they had an al-Qaeda spinoff problem (Jemmayiah Islamia (sp)) after they blew a bunch of partying tourists to pieces on Bali. Even now JI runs rampant in places like Ambon and even Aceh, fanning the fires of communal strife.

Bad, bad mess.