Indonesia orders hundreds of diplomats home
JAKARTA (JP): The monetary crisis has forced Indonesia to begin calling home at least 200 of its diplomats stationed abroad.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas confirmed the plan after attending the Third Meeting of the Joint Commission on Economic and Technical Cooperation between Thailand and Indonesia yesterday.
He said the diplomats would not be replaced.
The ministry's secretary-general, Abdul Irsan, said before the pullback that about 1,200 diplomats were posted in 111 missions overseas.
Alatas said the ministry had also decided to shorten diplomats' time of service in foreign countries from the current average of four years to two-and-a-half years.
"Those who have stayed abroad for two-and-a-half years will probably be pulled back home," Alatas said, adding that when they reached home, the officials would be deployed in various directorate general offices in the ministry, in accordance with their respective expertise.
Funds allocated to the ministry for routine expenditure in the 1998/1999 draft budget presented to the House of Representatives last month increased to Rp 1.34 trillion from the previous year's Rp 961 billion.
But the budget for development expenses -- for projects such as promotion and countering negative publicity about Indonesia abroad, shrunk to Rp 12.88 billion from the previous year's Rp 49 billion.
After the budget was presented, Alatas admitted that austerity measures were needed given the rupiah's drastic depreciation against the U.S. dollar.
Indonesia's permanent representative at the United Nations, Ambassador Makarim Wibisono said yesterday that this month alone five diplomats had been sent home.
"Other diplomats will follow in the near future," Makarim told reporters after meeting with President Soeharto at the President's residence on Jl. Cendana, Central Jakarta.
Makarim said that if the campaign to call home diplomats continued, the number abroad would be halved by June.
The Joint Commission meeting said there had been an exchange of information on economic problems in both Indonesia and Thailand and the development of international and regional economics.
The meeting also discussed the possibility of Thailand opening a consulate here.
Both countries have also agreed to boost trade, investment, tourism, research and technological cooperation.
Minister Alatas and his counterpart, Minister Surin Pitsuwan, signed on behalf of their respective governments at the end of the meeting the Agreement for the Promotion and Protection of Investments.
The Thai government, through minister Surin, yesterday symbolically gave one-million-baht (US$24,400) worth of medicine to the people of Irian Jaya who are recovering from a drought. (byg/prb)