RI, Australia plan counterterrorism summit: Downer
RI, Australia plan counterterrorism summit: Downer
Agencies, Sydney
Indonesia and Australia are planning to organize an Asia-Pacific regional summit to help better coordinate the fight against terrorism, Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer said on Sunday.
Downer said the proposal would be on the agenda during an upcoming visit to Australia by his Indonesian counterpart Hassan Wirayuda.
"The general idea that he and I have is that we would bring together relevant ministers -- there would be foreign ministers, perhaps justice ministers as well, police ministers conceivably -- from around the Asia-Pacific region, but particularly Australia, South East Asia, perhaps north Asia as well, plus the United States," Downer told Channel Seven.
"We would be able to not only review where we're at in terms of intelligence cooperation, police cooperation and the like in the region but see what further steps could be made to take that forward."
The announcement came five days after an apparent suicide bomb in Jakarta's downtown JW Marriott hotel killed 11 people, including one foreigner, and injured 149 others. It was followed by new warnings from U.S. authorities that Islamic extremists were planning new attacks in the region.
The explosion occurred just two days before Amrozi bin Nurhasyim was sentenced to death for planning last year's attack on the Indonesian tourist island of Bali that killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.
Spokesman for Indonesia's ministry of foreign affairs Marty Natalegawa confirmed the plan but stressed that the two countries had long explored the possibility even before the Marriott bombing last week.
"Of course with the Marriott bombing, a regional summit on terrorism is becoming more pressing," Marty told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.
He also said that the plan would be finalized during the visit of Hassan Wirayuda to Australia on Aug. 21.
Downer said while there had been improvements in counter- terrorism cooperation between governments since the U.S. attacks on Sep. 11, 2001, "there's still a fair way to go".
"Not so much in terms of Australia's cooperation, but cooperation between the ASEAN countries and between ASEAN and non-ASEAN countries in east Asia," he said.
Cooperation between Australian and Indonesian police was instrumental in capturing those responsible for last October's Bali bombing, including Amrozi, who was last week sentenced to death by an Indonesian court for his part in the attack.
Australian police are also helping investigate last week's Jakarta hotel bombing that killed at least 11 people.
Meanwhile, Australian Defense Force chief Peter Cosgrove on Sunday described a ban on his troops working with Indonesia's Kopassus special forces as folly that was hindering the regional war on terrorism.
Australia stopped joint training exercises with the Indonesian military in 1999 following massacres in East Timor allegedly coordinated by the Army's Special Forces Kopassus following a vote for independence from East Timor.
The special forces unit has also been accused of human rights abuses in Irian Jaya, Aceh and Ambon.
But Cosgrove said Kopassus was the major counterterrorism force in Indonesia, meaning his troops had to have some contact with the unit, even if in a strictly limited capacity.
"We're saying that we should focus on the here and now and what is very necessary for the safety of our people and Indonesian people," he told ABC television.
"We should collaborate strictly in those areas where we can all agree that it would be folly if we didn't have some relationship and some arrangement to help save lives."
In November, defense minister Robert Hill said that re- engaging with Kopassus could be seen as sending the "wrong message in terms of the sort of values that we think underpin a civilized society".
Since then Australian and Indonesian officials have held talks on counter terrorism joint exercises that would inevitably involve Kopassus.
Damien Kingsbury, an Indonesia specialist at Deakin University, predicted strong opposition in Australia to links with Kopassus and said the emphasis should be on relations with the civilian-controlled police force.
"Kopassus practices state terror and has close links to a range of terrorist and militia groups," Kingsbury said last week.