Indonesia must disarm East Timorese militias

Indonesia must disarm East Timorese militias

By Charles Himawan

JAKARTA (JP): Many nationalists in the field of politics,
economy, military and law have cried for the government to resist
international demand to disarm the militias with regard to the
Atambua case.

However they have overlooked the fact that in the murdering of
the three United Nations staff, the international community sees
the militias as having committed a crime against humanity.

Starting with the earth scorching of East Timor, Indonesia had
always tried to hide itself behind the concept of sovereignty
whenever there is a possibility of international intervention.

To understand the emergence of international intervention, one
needs to accept the following three premises.

First, we are now living in a borderless world. What we do
will affect others and what others do will affect us. Second, the
threat of international intervention will emerge only if the
international community judges that national institutions have
failed to uphold global justice.

And third, the meaning of sovereignty in the 21st century has
evolved and developed greatly from its inception in the 19th
century to the 20th century.

We are now living in the communication age. A grave event in a
particular country spreads like brushfire.

The killings in Atambua occurred just when the UN was holding
its millennium talks. The forum held a brief silence in memory of
the three who were killed. A disturbing word from Gus Dur
(President Abdurrahman Wahid), leader of sovereign Indonesia,
sends tremors in the financial world and deters international
fund managers from investing their money in Indonesia.

In 1997, Thailand on the basis of its own sovereignty,
devalued its baht and the shock waves caused Indonesia's economy
to collapse.

International intervention does not come by itself. It is not
the cause but the effect. Members of the UN have agreed that a
country that violates international tenets of peace will be
punished.

As a "world police", the UN, usually spearheaded by the
economic and military strength of the United States, would impose
punishment, often in the form of military intervention or
economic embargo or both.

International armed intervention against Indonesia is out of
the question. Indonesia is no Iraq that invaded Kuwait. Indonesia
did not invade East Timor after the 1999 referendum, though it
failed to secure peace.

Neither did Indonesia invade East Timor way back in 1975,
though international dossiers qualified the action of Indonesia
as that of an invasion. Supporters from both camps today remain
strong in their respective arguments.

In the case of Atambua, economic sanctions would only be
imposed if Indonesia fails to uphold global justice (not simply
national justice). The international community feels that global
justice would be restored if the major cause of the injustice,
the armed militias, are disarmed and the perpetrators brought to
court.

With regard to the militias, the National Commission on Human
Rights on Sept. 8 was the first to call for the government to
disarm them.

Unfortunately the government did not respond. The government
eventually responded only after Secretary-General Kofi Annan
himself, the UN Security Council and the U.S. Secretary of
Defense, William Cohen, "entered" the scene.

The question is: Wouldn't it be better had Indonesia responded
to the demands of the commission earlier, a real national
institution, thus avoiding the intervention of an international
institution? In a sense, Indonesia "invited" an international
intervention.

One plausible reason for this unwanted "invitation" is that
Indonesia misconstrued the concept of sovereignty. Indonesia
believes that because it is a sovereign country, it can do
anything within its geographical boundary.

This is a concept of the 19th century and earlier. Beginning
with the establishment of the League of Nations in the early 20th
century, that concept had begun to erode.

At the early stages, it may be said that individual countries
only surrendered a small part of their sovereignty to the League
of Nations.

However, when the UN was established in the middle of the 20th
century, the member countries actually surrendered a much greater
part of their sovereignty to the international body.

Today, after 50 years development, in terms of crimes against
humanity, a country's sovereignty becomes relatively smaller
still as exemplified by the International Tribunal sessions for
the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

If Indonesia disarms the militias, the government would not be
compromising its sovereignty at all. It instead would be
fulfilling its obligation as a responsible member of the
international community.

By disarming the militias, Indonesia would show the world that
its sovereignty is still intact. It has the ability to secure
peace. Certainly the shame and discomfort are already there
because Indonesia failed on its own initiative to properly
exercise its sovereignty.

The writer is a member of the National Commission on Human
Rights and a professor of law at the University of Indonesia.