Military remains cautious with Australia
JAKARTA (JP): The government seems to be making symbolic steps toward repairing diplomatic ties with Australia, but for the Indonesian Military (TNI) the neighboring country remains a source of concern and apprehension.
Senior military officials maintain that their wariness is not without reason.
TNI spokesman Rear Air Marshall Graito Usodo said Australia had repeatedly highlighted and intervened in issues by putting TNI in a negative light under the guise of human rights as justification.
"There are many times we have been tricked by the Australians, many times," Graito told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.
"The human rights issue is a way for them to justify their interference in our country," he remarked.
Graito pointed to a recent report from the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) which presented a 16-point complaint on TNI on border issues between East Timor and East Nusa Tenggara.
He said the accusations were groundless.
"Once again, when we checked and investigated these complaints, none of them were true. We have drafted our clarification over the reports," he added.
While UNTAET is an amalgamation of forces from various nations, Australia has the largest contingent and government officials have hinted that it is mostly Australian soldiers who patrol the East Timor half of the border.
On Wednesday, Minister of Foreign Affairs Alwi Shihab said after a meeting with several TNI officials that Indonesia would formally ask the UN not to place Australian troops on the border because of "cultural differences".
The jarred diplomatic and military relationship between the two countries has persisted since Australia's strong involvement in a multilateral force in East Timor in September.
Indonesian defense officials have also repeatedly maintained that Australian military airplanes violated Indonesian airspace. Canberra has denied such claims.
The issue came to the fore again when British magazine Flight International and the Australian Financial Review reported last month that Australian PC3 Orion planes had been converted to conduct secret spy missions from international airspace on Indonesia.
The report said the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) Orions, under the code name "Peacemake", were monitoring the Indonesian Military and other communications.
Relations were also not helped when it was discovered recently that an Australian soldier had paid a Timorese to conduct espionage on Indonesian territory.
Graito also vouched on Thursday for Maj. Gen. Kiki Syahnakri, the former chief of the restoration command in East Timor, over his testimony on the death of journalist Sander Thoenes who was killed at the height of violence in East Timor in September.
Kiki recently said Indonesian doctors who conducted an autopsy on Thoenes did not find any bullet holes on the deceased's body.
His statement runs contrary to reports of an autopsy conducted on the body in Australia which states that a bullet hole was found on Thoenes' body.
The military has also denied reports that it was involved in the journalist's death.
The shooting of Thoenes is one of five cases focused on by the Indonesian Attorney General's Office in its investigation of violence in East Timor.
"I know Gen. Kiki as a true patriotic soldier and there was no possibility at all that he would lie over such a statement," Graito said of the Udayana Military Commander.
But separately, James Cotton, a professor from the Australian Defense Force Academy, told the Post here on Thursday that these repeated accusations were merely based on long bitterness harbored by TNI as they were unhappy with the presence of Australian troops in East Timor.
Cotton said many of the complaints were also exaggerated, stressing that the overall relationship between the two armed forces could be viewed as "normal".
He further noted that espionage was conducted by every country. (dja)