ICMI urges Indonesia to harness BoP to mediate conflicts

Jakarta – Achmad Baidowi, a member of the Advisory Council of the Indonesian Association of Muslim Intellectuals (ICMI), urged Indonesia to maximise its role in the Board of Peace (BoP) to defuse tensions in the Middle East involving the United States-Israel coalition and Iran. He said the crisis in the Middle East could endure for a long time and be uncertain, necessitating robust international diplomacy, including from neutral states like Indonesia. “Indonesia, being part of the Board of Peace (BoP), must be able to utilise it to dampen tensions in the Gulf region,” Baidowi said. He explained that the crisis in the Middle East is expected to have wide impacts on global stability, particularly in the energy sector, amid rising tensions in the Gulf, which has become the main conduit for global oil distribution. He warned that the escalation could disrupt global energy distribution if major shipping lanes are disrupted, especially if tensions trigger disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz, which has long been one of the world’s most strategic oil shipping routes. Baidowi assessed that this condition requires an active diplomatic response to prevent the conflict from widening and triggering global economic instability. “Indonesia’s role could be to mediate the conflict so that both sides are willing to sit down to negotiate, at least to halt the war,” he said. He added that this role aligns with Indonesia’s foreign policy principle of bebas aktif (free and active diplomacy) in the pursuit of world peace. Therefore, Baidowi hopes Indonesia will not only be a formal member in international forums such as BoP, but will actively promote dialogue and peaceful diplomacy amidst rising geopolitical tension in the Middle East. “When Indonesia is within the BoP, it must actively contribute to creating world peace through diplomacy,” he said.