KL ready to talk further on Sipadan and Ligitan
KL ready to talk further on Sipadan and Ligitan
JAKARTA (JP): Visiting Malaysian Foreign Minister Abdullah
Badawi dodged questions yesterday on the likelihood of taking the
disputed Sipadan and Ligitan Islands to international
arbitration, stressing instead Kuala Lumpur's commitment to
further talks.
"At this time, let's just follow what has been agreed and
understood between the two leaders," he said on his arrival at
Soekarno-Hatta airport yesterday afternoon.
Badawi is here to attend today's one-day ministerial meeting
of the fourth Indonesia-Malaysia joint commission. He is
scheduled to pay a courtesy call on President Soeharto this
morning.
A joint working group meeting on the Sipadan and Ligitan
islands in Jakarta last year ended in deadlock when Malaysia, to
the surprise of Indonesia, argued that the issue should be taken
to the International Court of Justice.
Indonesia rejected the Malaysian proposal, saying that if
bilateral channels were exhausted the matter could be taken to
the ASEAN High Council.
Indonesia and Malaysia are founding members of ASEAN, whose
other members are Brunei, Singapore, the Philippines and
Thailand.
Both Indonesia and Malaysia have for a long time laid claim to
the Sipadan and Ligitan Islands, located just off the east coast
of Kalimantan. The two countries base their respective claims on
maps they each inherited from their former colonial rulers, the
British in Malaysia and the Dutch in Indonesia.
Despite the stalemate at the working group level, during a
meeting between Soeharto and Mahathir last September, Malaysia
seemed to acquiesce in the Indonesian position, agreeing to
continue further bilateral talks on the overlapping claims.
"This demonstrates the goodwill between the two leaders and
the mutual sincerity to solve this matter amicably," Badawi said
yesterday.
The heads of state also agreed that further discussions would
be undertaken by selected representatives.
Badawi yesterday refused to comment on exactly what level
those representatives would be, saying that they would be made
public after the selection was made.
Delegates to the joint commission meeting have stated that the
Sipadan and Ligitan dispute would not be the highlight of the
meeting but would only be among several bilateral issues to be
discussed.
A group of senior officials began conversing on Tuesday to
prepare for today's ministerial meeting.
According to Izhar Ibrahim, the director general of political
affairs and head of the Indonesian delegation, there will not be
a new exchange of documents at the commission meeting. He said
the senior officials would simply review the reports of the
working group.
He said that among the important issues to be discussed at the
ministerial level meeting were the growth of economic cooperation
zones, the flow of workers between the two countries and the
influx of illegal Indonesian workers in Malaysia. (mds)