Govt eyes monitoring agency for Aceh
Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
In the next round of peace talks on Aceh, the government will propose to establish an independent committee to supervise the implementation of a cease-fire between the government and the separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM).
Learning from past failures to implement a ceasefire, Minister of Foreign Affairs Hassan Wirayuda said members of the monitoring team would be recruited from a third party, not from the government or GAM.
"The concept is that we need to have a monitoring committee to ensure the effectiveness of the cessation of hostility. Members of the monitoring committee should come from a third party," Hassan said on Monday.
He said the independent monitoring committee would emulate a similar committee established in Moro, Southern Philippines, to supervise the implementation of a ceasefire between the Philippine troops and the rebel group, the Moro National Liberation Front.
Indonesia at that time sent observers to Moro to join the monitoring team in the mid-1990s.
When asked if Indonesia would allow foreigners to sit on the proposed monitoring committee, Hassan said: "We haven't discussed any details yet on the idea."
He added that the committee would have the authority to conduct an investigation into any violence occurring after the planned agreement.
Representatives of the government and GAM will sit for peace talks in Geneva early this October to end a chain of violence rampaging the territory.
The peace talks will be facilitated by the Henry Dunant Center (HDC), which has been brokering talks between the government and GAM for the past three years.
The government and GAM agreed in early 2000 to end the violence in Aceh, but the agreement failed to stop the violence. They accused each other of failing to honor the agreement.
"That is why we need to make a different arrangement than the one we had in the past," Hassan said.
He assured that the upcoming agreement would be different as GAM had agreed to accept the special autonomy law for Aceh, with some revisions.
Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono explained that the upcoming agreement on the cessation of hostility would contain articles regarding the monitoring committee.
He also said that the agreement would enable the Indonesian Military (TNI) and GAM to work together and curb criminal actions conducted by bad elements in TNI and GAM.
"GAM admitted that there were bad elements that could not be controlled. After the signing of the agreement, all those bad elements in the province will be treated as the common enemy," he said.
The minister said that the government had sent the peace proposal to GAM through the HDC and there were three articles that needed to be further discussed.
"The three articles are on a demilitarized zone, political rights for all GAM members that are willing to return to the Republic of Indonesia and the process to review the special autonomy law," Susilo said.