The most salient arguments for the resumption of military aid are made on behalf of Aceh and Irian Jaya. In these beleaguered provinces separatist movements, recently reinvigorated by East Timor’s hard-won success, have been struggling for decades.
Perhaps that is the reason why Indonesia has many struggle which want own autonomy for their region, control their region by theirself without any force from central government because they think that Central Government not fair for allocate the annual budget to the local region. Bad diplomatic policy in the International court make Indonesia territory become disappear one by one, Indonesia Diplomat can't make a good deal to keeping the Indonesia territory. This situation also worsened by military operations that hedge human rights in the disputes regional. Conflict between local people and military made the situation more complicated.
The Fact in Aceh:
This oil-rich western province is located at the head of the Malacca strait that links the Pacific and Indian oceans-- one of the most strategic waterways in the world. While most Americans would be hard pressed to find Aceh on a map, its oil wealth is key to Jakarta’s power and extremely valuable for U.S. corporations. The New York Times acknowledged Aceh’s centrality when it noted that the province of 4.1 million people, "is far more important to Indonesia’s future and that of South East Asia than East Timor ever was." Aceh’s oil and other commodities contribute 20% of Indonesia’s annual budget, but only 1% is reinvested into the province.
In the late 1980s, in response to the burgeoning movement for independence, Jakarta declared the province a "Military Operations Area" (known by its Indonesian acronym DOM). During the DOM era, thousands of Acehnese civilians were killed, raped, tortured, and abducted. The DOM was lifted in August 1998, but the violence continues. During two days in November 2000, more than a hundred unarmed Acehnese civilians attending a rally were shot dead by security forces. Last year at least one thousand people, mostly civilians and separatists guerrillas, were killed—three times the number killed in 1999. The death toll for this year has already exceeded 1,100.
For the most part, the war in Aceh has taken place beneath the radar screen of Western media and politics. But two brutal incidents in late 2000 brought the plight the Acehnese and the role of U.S. weapons to the front pages of American newspapers. Jafar Siddiq Hamzah, a prominent Acehnese lawyer with permanent residence in the U.S., was working for human rights and a peaceful resolution to the conflict when he was disappeared, tortured and murdered. His body was found in September 2000 along with four other unidentified bodies in an area that the military frequently uses to dispose of bodies. A few months later, "military death squads" killed three Acehnese working for a Danish aid group. A survivor of the attack was able to give his testimony to Human Rights Watch before going into hiding. He reported that the leader "carried a machine gun, I think it was an M-16, and had an FN pistol on his waist. Another one had a machine gun with a grenade launcher attached. The commander…had a pistol and an automatic rifle, most of the others also carried rifles."
From the U.S. perspective, Aceh is important as a location for U.S.-owned oil companies, but their presence has not encouraged respect for human rights. ExxonMobil, the largest publicly held corporation in the United States, has a huge oil and gas operation in Aceh. The company was sued in June by International Labor Rights Fund on behalf of eleven Acehnese who lived and worked near ExxonMobil’s operations. The villagers contend that they and their families have been the victims of murder, torture, kidnapping and rape at the hands of Indonesian military units guarding ExxonMobil’s gas fields. The suit, filed in Washington, DC, charges that the company provided the Indonesian military with logistical and material support, including:
• Buildings used by the Kopassus (Indonesian Special Forces) units to "interrogate, torture and murder Acehnese civilians."
• Heavy equipment like excavators used by the military to dig mass graves.
• Access to ExxonMobil constructed roads to transport victims to mass grave sites.
This collaboration demonstrates the two party’s mutual goal of maintaining Indonesian control of the province. The IFRF suit claims that the ExxonMobil fears that the "creation of an independent state for the people of Aceh as the result of a democratic uprising" would nullify their "business arrangement with the Indonesian government." Until March 2000, when ExxonMobil suspended operations after a spate of attacks on their pipeline, Jakarta received an estimated $100 million in revenue from the company every month. In an effort to ensure their revenue stream and reassure ExxonMobil, Jakarta sent three additional battalions of troops and an armored calvary unit to beef up security in the region. ExxonMobil resumed limited production a few months later.
Related under this Articles: Indonesia Military and U.S business
Source: Indonesia at the Crossroads
A Special Report
by Frida Berrigan
September 2001
Indonesia is "on the road to becoming a real democracy."
Paul Wolfowitz, former Ambassador to Indonesia and current Deputy Secretary of Defense
Link on:
Masters of terror: Indonesia's military & violence in East Timor in 1999 (Canberra papers on strategy & defence)
Indonesia's War over Aceh: Last Stand on Mecca's Porch (Politics in Asia)
Emergency and Confrontation: Australian Military Operations in Malaya and Borneo 1950-1966 (Official History of Australia's Involvement in Southeast Asian Conflicts, 1948-1975)
Book's review:
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| Indonesia's Military and Violence in East Timor |
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| Security, and Development in Timor Leste |
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| Timor Leste: Politics, History, and Culture |
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| Timor Leste: Politics, History, and Culture |
