Malino-like peace action sought to settle problems in Aceh
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The government is exploring the possibility of holding peace talks in the country to end the long-standing separatist conflict in the province of Aceh if the dialog overseas proves fruitless, a senior minister said on Wednesday.
"If the dialog being held so far abroad fails to resolve the problem, then we are looking at whether it is possible to promote peace talks at home as we did in Malino for the Maluku and Poso conflicts," Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told Antara.
Susilo was speaking to journalists during a two-day visit to Aceh and was accompanied by National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar. Susilo flew home to Jakarta later on Wednesday.
The government has brokered two separate rounds of peace talks in Malino, a hillside resort in the South Sulawesi town of Gowa, to quell religious fighting around the town of Poso, Central Sulawesi, and in the Maluku islands.
Susilo admitted that the conflict in Aceh was different from those in Poso and the Malukus, but said the possibility of holding peace talks to stop the separatist fighting must be examined.
Unlike Muslims and Christians who are in conflict with one another in Maluku and Poso, Acehnese separatists belonging to the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) are at odds with the central government.
GAM has been violently campaigning since 1976 for an independent Islamic state in Aceh, where an estimated 10,000 people have been killed so far.
However, Susilo said it would be up to the GAM leaders to accept or reject the proposed plan for talks in the country. "If they are ready to do so, the chance for a dialog is still open," he added.
The Indonesian government and GAM leaders have held peace talks several times in Switzerland under the mediation of the Henry Dunant Center to try to end the separatist fighting.
The latest talks took place on Feb. 3, also in Switzerland, but they ended without achieving a deal other than an agreement to further the dialog at an unspecified date.
Susilo said the talks, held many times abroad between the government and GAM, had failed to reach a satisfactory outcome.
He said a security approach alone would not settle the problems in Aceh but security could be improved if GAM members halted their armed struggle and terror.
However, Susilo said: "We will activate and intensify the restoration of security in an accurate way and not make target mistakes while continuing to improve the conduct of security personnel on duty in Aceh".
The U.S. State Department in its annual rights report said on Monday that security forces "were responsible for numerous instances of, at times indiscriminate, shooting of civilians, torture, rape, beatings and other abuse, and arbitrary detention in Aceh" and elsewhere in Indonesia.
The report, quoted by AFP, also rapped the killings of civilians by the separatists.
In the meantime, the Indonesian Military claims to have shot dead a 25-year-old GAM member, Munasir, in a gunfight at Kandang village, North Aceh regency, on Wednesday morning.
During the incident, the military said it also confiscated a gun, 35 bullets, 20 firecrackers and a GAM document from the victim.
Rights activists in Pidie district said the body of a village chief bearing severe torture marks was found on Tuesday, a day after he was abducted from his home by unknown men.
Humanitarian activists found two bodies with gunshot wounds at Alue Pisang in South Aceh while another was found at Saree in Aceh Besar district.
Soldiers conducting a raid at Kuala Beukah in East Aceh shot dead one rebel and arrested another on Tuesday, said the local military commander, Lieutenant Colonel Muhammad Nakir.