Jakarta needs 'flexible' figure in Canberra

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia must appoint someone "flexible" as its next ambassador to Australia, Harold Crouch, a senior Australian scholar on Indonesia, said yesterday.

Crouch, the author of the 1978 book The Army and Politics in Indonesia, said it is not a question of whether Indonesia sends a person with a military or civilian background to fill the post in Canberra.

"Australians need a more open, flexible figure like August Marpaung and Sabam Siagian," he said, referring of two former Indonesian ambassadors to Australia who were considered successful in their posts despite the often strenuous relations between the two countries.

"Siagian loved to invite reporters over for a beer ... the (media) reports remained critical, but never personally attacking Siagian," he said.

Crouch, a senior fellow at the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies at the Australian National University, is in Jakarta to attend a seminar on the history of the Indonesian revolution organized by the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI).

The late Marpaung was a senior Army officer when he assumed his ambassadorial post in the 1980s. Sabam Siagian was a senior journalist before he was assigned to the post in 1991; he is scheduled to end his term this month.

Indonesia last week withdrew the nomination of Lt. Gen. (ret.) H.B.L. Mantiri to replace Sabam in Canberra after an outcry in Australia, fanned by remarks he made in 1992 regarding tragic events in East Timor the previous year.

Mantiri, who was not personally involved in the incidents in East Timor which claimed the lives of more than 50 civilians, told the Indonesian Editor magazine in 1992 that the military had acted properly in handling the situation.

An internal military investigation later found errors in judgment and procedures by the military.

Indonesia has said that it will leave the Canberra post vacant until further notice, a move widely seen as downgrading the diplomatic relations between the two countries.

Indonesian officials point out that Mantiri's nomination had already been accepted by Canberra before the public outcry began.

Crouch explained that the anger over Mantiri's nomination was not so much a result of his attachment to the military, but more because the Australian media uncovered the Editor interview.

"Mantiri himself wasn't helpful at all in his following comments," Crouch said. "But nothing could have been done anyway. It would have been really disastrous (if he had been appointed)."

Crouch described Rear Marshall Roesman, who served as ambassador before Sabam, as "quite hopeless, (because) he would say things which were quite untrue."

Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Alatas said yesterday there were no new developments since his announcement that Indonesia would leave the Canberra post vacant.

"The mission will be led by the charge d'affaires," he told reporters at the State Palace.

Asked if he felt the latest affair would disrupt relations between the two countries, he said that he hoped relations were strong enough to withstand the current setback.

"The relations are quite strong being supported by already substantive ties so they will be able continue without being affected by this new development.

"This condition is the result of the efforts we have put forth in the last several years, to give weight to our cooperation so that if some tremors or incidents like this occurred, relations in general would not be affected." (anr/emb)