Govt told to settle borders with neighbors<\/p>\n
Debbie A. Lubis, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta<\/p>\n
Taking a lesson from the loss of Sipadan and Ligitan islands,
\nIndonesia needs to uphold its sovereignty by promoting
\nnegotiation to settle disputes over maritime borders with
\nneighboring countries, a legal expert has said.<\/p>\n
Etty R. Agoes, a legal expert at the Ministry for Fisheries
\nand Maritime Affairs, said on Monday that the country needed to
\ntake effective measures to force each neighboring country to
\nnegotiate its maritime territory through agreements on sea
\nterritory, continental coastline, and exclusive economic zones
\n(EEZ).<\/p>\n
"We must settle all problems of maritime borders otherwise we
\nwill lose more islands and maritime territory. We should improve
\nour quality of diplomacy and bargaining position so that our
\nneighboring countries will not be reluctant to negotiate," she
\nsaid during a discussion here on Monday.<\/p>\n
The International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands
\nvoted overwhelmingly on Dec. 17, to award Sipadan and Ligitan
\nislands, located on the northernmost tip of East Kalimantan, to
\nMalaysia.<\/p>\n
The decision ended a three-decade-long legal battle between
\nthe neighboring Southeast Asian countries.<\/p>\n
Etty, who is also a professor of international law at
\nPadjadjaran University, Bandung, West Java, said that the country
\nshared maritime borders with 10 countries and only had land
\nborders with three countries.<\/p>\n
Speaking at a seminar titled: The Future of Indonesian
\nMaritime Borders, she said that the country so far has made
\nagreements on its continental coastline with Malaysia, Thailand,
\nIndia, Papua New Guinea, and Australia and had only one EEZ
\nagreement which was with Australia.<\/p>\n
Etty said that there were only two agreements on sea territory
\nthat the country has made; with Malaysia in 1970 and Singapore in
\n1973.<\/p>\n
Based on the international convention on the sea, a country's
\nsea territory is 12 miles from the outermost island, its EEZ is
\n200 miles, and its continental coastline base is between 200 and
\n350 miles.<\/p>\n
Etty said that the first measure the country should take was
\nto revise Government Ruling No. 38\/2002 on National Maritime
\nTerritory that still included Sipadan and Ligitan islands and
\nimmediately negotiate the country's border with the two islands.<\/p>\n
"Hopefully we can repeat the success of the negotiation over
\nAustralia's Christmas island in 1997 that stipulated that the
\nisland's EEZ was 38.75 miles because the island has no fixed
\ninhabitants while our Java island has almost two hundred million
\npeople. International Law decided that the settlement should be
\nfair," she said.<\/p>\n
Etty added that the country should also settle the problem of
\nits continental coastline with Vietnam which was located to the
\nnorth of Natuna island.<\/p>\n
"We have negotiated 20 times in 20 years but no agreement has
\never been made because each meeting has started from zero. We
\nshould improve our negotiation team because Vietnam now is backed
\nby Canada," she said.<\/p>\n
Etty said that the country should also discuss maritime border
\nproblems with Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, East Timor,
\nPalau, and Malaysia.<\/p>\n
First Adm. Soesetyo, head of the hydro-oceanography division
\nat the Naval Headquarters, said that it was also high time for
\nthe country to discuss Singapore's reclamation program because it
\ncould threaten the country's sovereignty.<\/p>\n
"Singapore has combined eight islands into Jurong island
\nthrough reclamation and enlarged its territory by 3.5 kilometers
\nto the southwest and also enlarged the Changi airport area five
\nkilometers to the east. Those locations have not been included in
\nthe 1973 agreement," he said.<\/p>\n
Etty suggested the government unilaterally plot out its
\nterritory on a map since Singapore always refused to negotiate
\nwith Indonesia over the matter.<\/p>\n
"We can mark out our territory with the U.N. so it will be
\npublished on the U.N. website and then the whole world will know
\nthat this territory is ours," she said.<\/p>\n
Etty also suggested that the government report to the U.N. its
\n17,580 islands including their location and coordinates.<\/p>\n
"But first of all, we should name all of the islands since
\nonly 5,000 of them have already been named," she said.<\/p>\n
Nasri Gustaman of the politics and regional studies division
\nat the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, however, said that currently
\nthe country was holding negotiations with Vietnam and the
\nPhilippines.<\/p>\n
"We prefer not to use provocative measures to settle the
\nborder problems because we still uphold the principle of
\nmaintaining good relations with other countries," he said.<\/p>",
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