Government to lift Aceh's emergency status
Government to lift Aceh's emergency status
Agencies, Banda Aceh, Aceh
A civilian emergency law imposed on Aceh last year to deal with a simmering rebellion will be lifted this month, the head of the tsunami-hit province's reconstruction agency said on Sunday.
The move could signal the government's willingness to intensify efforts to strike a peace deal with rebels of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) when a fourth round of peace talks is held in Helsinki, Finland, from May 26 to 31.
"It will not be extended," Kuntoro Mangkusubroto, chairman of the powerful agency, told Reuters in the first disclosure of the government's intention to lift the emergency status.
Kuntoro, a respected former energy minister, made no further comments on the law nor give a precise date for when it would be removed. It was introduced a year ago and extended for six months last November. It followed one year of martial law.
Under emergency law, the civilian authority has governed Aceh and can enforce security measures such as curfews and house searches. But military personnel were not withdrawn when it first took effect and clashes with rebels have been routine.
Underscoring Aceh's fragile security, a soldier and three GAM rebels were killed during a clash on Friday in a village in northern Aceh, the military said on Sunday.
Both Indonesia and the rebels were forced back to the negotiating table after a giant tsunami slammed into Aceh on Dec. 26, leaving around 160,000 Acehnese dead or missing.
Thorny security and political issues are expected to be discussed at the fourth round of talks this month.
The three-decade long separatist struggle in Aceh has claimed more than 12,000 lives, many of them civilians.
Kuntoro was recently appointed to head the Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Body for the Areas of Aceh Province and Nias Island, North Sumatra. His agency will manage nearly $5 billion.
Meanwhile, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick visited Aceh on Sunday to publicize America's role in rebuilding the region -- an undertaking Washington hopes will boost the country's battered image elsewhere in Indonesia.
He met with local officials in Banda Aceh. Later in the day, he was scheduled to inspect a washed-out coastal road and pledge US$245 million (euro190 million) to rebuild it, AP reported.
America has since pledged nearly US$1 billion (euro770 million) in public and private funds for relief efforts for tsunami-hit countries. Most of the funds are earmarked for Aceh.
The relief effort comes as anti-American sentiment in Indonesia remains at record highs after the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, which were perceived by many here as attacks on Islam. The U.S. help has been welcomed in Aceh, where distrust of the Jakarta government is high.
Zoellick said he saw hope was alive in the eyes of Acehnese people
"They try to create a new Aceh and that gives me a sense of hope," he was quoted by AFP as saying after witnessing the signing of a memorandum of agreement with the Indonesian government for the financing of the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the main highway linking Banda Aceh to the west coast.
"What we are starting today may give hope to bring life back and a continuity to the people of Aceh," Zoellick said.
The US$245 million project will help reconstruct the main highway linking the provincial capital to the town of Meulaboh, some 240 kilometers away on the west coast of Aceh.
On Saturday, Zoellick met with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono in Jakarta and said full normalization of military ties with Indonesia was contingent on Jakarta's efforts to solve the killing of two Americans in Papua province and its dealing with atrocities in East Timor.
He was referring to an ambush near a Freeport gold mine in 2002, in which two American teachers and an Indonesian were killed.