RI, GAM ready to resume talks, focus on autonomy

RI, GAM ready to resume talks, focus on autonomy

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta

The government is ready to resume peace talks with Free Aceh
Movement (GAM) rebel leaders after they agreed negotiations
should focus on the government's offer for special autonomy, a
senior minister says.

However, a GAM leader said while the separatists were prepared
to start the dialog by discussing the autonomy offer, they had
already rejected it.

Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security
Affairs Widodo Adi Sucipto said a high-level delegation would fly
to Finland's capital of Helsinki on Saturday and start talks on
Monday.

The government said it expects progress from the second round
of peace talks, which will be facilitated by the Crisis
Management Initiative (CMI), a global mediator headed by former
president of Finland Martti Ahtisaari.

"We have received confirmation (from the CMI) that the talks
will revolve around the special autonomy. We do hope for
concrete progress," Widodo said on Friday after a limited Cabinet
meeting at the Presidential Office.

Widodo reiterated that Jakarta was seeking "a permanent and
comprehensive" settlement rather than a temporary solution to the
Indonesian Military-GAM conflict in Aceh, which first began in
1976.

The Indonesian delegation will include Minister of Justice and
Human Rights Hamid Awaluddin as the chief negotiator; along with
Minister of Communications and Information Sofyan Djalil and
other state officials, while Widodo would oversee the delegation.

The same group earlier held talks with the GAM leaders in
Helsinki in January but came out with no long-term results. At
that time GAM was only interested in establishing a temporary
cease fire in Aceh to ensure effective humanitarian relief
operations in the tsunami-hit province.

Asked whether GAM had indicated its willingness to accept the
special autonomy scheme, Widodo said: "We'll talk the details
there. But the confirmation (from the mediator) makes us expect
more concrete results (from the second-round meeting)."

Meanwhile, Sofyan, who is an Aceh native, said that positive
results from the coming peace talks would be crucial for the
long-term reconstruction and development of Aceh, which bore the
brunt of the Asian tsunami where more than 200,000 people were
killed or remained missing.

"We need to talk to all the Acehnese when we rebuild Aceh,
including to our GAM brothers. Any settlement of the conflict
would be beneficial for the development of a new and better
Aceh," he said.

Both the government and GAM had earlier agreed to a temporary
cease fire plan via the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement signed
in 2002.

That truce broke down in 2003 and the government later imposed
martial law in the province and undertook a large-scale military
offensive against GAM rebels.

Rights groups have accused the military of killing many
civilians and of committing other human rights abuses during the
offensive.

Meanwhile, a GAM delegation member Noerdin Abdulhamid said
that the group was ready to talk with the Indonesian delegation,
but insisted that they would not accept the special autonomy
offer.

"We have received the invitation (sent by the CMI) and know
that the meeting will begin by discussing the special autonomy
for Aceh, but we have no intention of accepting the concept,"
Noerdin told The Jakarta Post by phone from Sweden.

Noerdin said that the GAM delegation, to be led by GAM's prime
minister for Aceh Malik Mahmood, had other points on their
agenda, including an offer of a cease-fire.

Other GAM members set to attend the meeting are Aceh's shadow
foreign minister Zaini Abdullah, along with GAM senior official
Mohammed Nur Djuli and spokesman Bakhtiar Abdullah.