Recent history of Chinese-Indonesians

Recent history of Chinese-Indonesians

* 1955: Indonesia and China sign an agreement on dual
citizenship, which allows Chinese people living in the country to
hold both Indonesian and Chinese citizenship.
* 1958: Indonesia approves the citizenship law, which stipulates
naturalization.
* 1959: Indonesia and China agree to a repatriation process for
140,000 ethnic Chinese.
* 1965: An aborted coup, blamed on the Indonesian Communist
Party, takes place. Jakarta accuses China of involvement, which
China denies.
* 1967: Diplomatic ties with China are frozen, bring an abrupt
halt to repatriations. About 100,000 people become stranded here
and are deemed stateless.
* 1969: Indonesia decides not to honor the dual citizenship
agreement. A Chinese person whose parents hold China citizenship
can only obtain Indonesia citizenship through naturalization,
which can only be proven proved by the issuance of an SBKRI.
* 1990: Indonesia resumes ties with China.
* 1992: Beijing says it will issue passports in January 1993 for
stateless Chinese here, whose number now reaches more than
240,000.
* 1996: Soeharto issues a decree on the annulment of the SBKRI
requirement. Chinese-Indonesians may instead use their ID cards,
birth certificates and kartu keluarga (family cards) for
education and business purposes.
* 1998: Habibie issues a decree ordering government officials to
treat all Indonesians the same.
* 1999: Habibie issues a decree banning discrimination against
Indonesians based on origin. -- JP