Amien hits out at foreign advisors

Amien hits out at foreign advisors

JAKARTA (JP): People's Consultative Assembly Speaker Amien
Rais said on Wednesday Indonesia did not need foreign advisors,
thus President Abdurrahman Wahid's appointment of several foreign
dignitaries in that role was merely a symbolic gesture.

"We don't need Kissinger, Lee Kwan Yew, Goh Chok Tong or
Qaddafi," Amien remarked.

"If Gus Dur appoints an outsider as an advisor it's merely
symbolic. But if it's a real advisor then we have to reject it
because we are a sovereign state," Amien said referring to the
President by his popular nickname.

President Abdurrahman recently asked former U.S. secretary of
state Henry Kissinger to become his advisor. Abdurrahman had
earlier also said he appointed Singapore senior minister Lee Kwan
Yew as his economic advisor.

Amien charged that such appointments, if taken seriously,
would only add to the regiment of presidential advisors.

"Maybe at one point we would have (Australian Prime Minister)
John Howard as general advisor to inspect security in the Asia
Pacific region," he quipped, referring to the much touted "Howard
Doctrine" recently condemned by Asian leaders in which the
Australian prime minister suggested that his country could take
over the role of the United States to "police" the region.

"Then we could possibly have (Chinese) President Jiang Zemin
as advisor on Chinese diplomacy. I think this is all just fooling
around," he remarked.

When asked for his comments on President Abdurrahman's apology
in East Timor on Tuesday, Amien said such a remark should only be
considered a diplomatic courtesy.

But he warned that if Abdurrahman's statement was an official
apology, then the President was going too far.

Amien asserted that people should also recognize that East
Timorese themselves were also to blame for the deaths of
thousands in the territory.

He asserted that East Timorese should also bear much of the
responsibility of the events dating back to the time of
integration. (mds)