Rival Maluku factions begin peace talks

Rival Maluku factions begin peace talks

Jupriadi, The Jakarta Post, Malino

All the 70 delegates from the warring factions have arrived in
the resort hill town of Malino in South Sulawesi to meet for
peace talks aimed at halting three years of sectarian fighting in
the troubled Maluku islands.

The 35 Christian representatives arrived by plane in the
province's capital of Makassar on Sunday afternoon, a day after
the Muslim delegation led by Thamrin Ely arrived on board the
same aircraft.

Members of the militant Java-based Laskar Jihad group will
reportedly be involved in the talks. But it remained unclear on
Sunday whether they were among the newly arrived Muslim
delegates.

The two-day peace talks will officially be opened on Monday in
Malino, Gowa regency, about 76 kilometers south of Makassar.

At least 19 members of the monitoring team comprising
religious and community leaders, and government and military
officials have also arrived at the venue. So has the nine-member
mediating team led by Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare
Jusuf Kalla.

The mediating team includes Maluku Governor Saleh Latuconsina,
South Sulawesi Governor H.Z.B. Palaguna, Maluku's Pattimura
Military Commander Brig. Gen. Mustopo, Maluku Police Chief Brig.
Gen. Sunarto DA, and Speaker of the Maluku Legislative Council Z.
Sahubura.

"All the delegates are prepared to negotiate in Malino. All
the mediating and monitoring teams are already here," Farid W.
Husein, an assistant to the head of the government's mediating
team, told The Jakarta Post last night in Makassar.

The two rival delegations were housed in two different hotels
that were tightly guarded by police in Makassar before they left
for Malino on Monday morning. The Muslim representatives were
accommodated in the Kenari Hotel and the Christian delegates at
the Losari Beach Hotel.

Farid said that during the fist day of the meetings on Monday,
mediators would meet separately with the two warring delegates.

On the second day on Tuesday, the two conflicting delegations
will meet at one table along with the mediators.

"The meeting will not discuss the reconciliation or peace
issue, but the essence of the talks will be how to halt the
conflict. The meeting is aimed at eliminating the passion behind
the clashes," Farid said.

He further said the talks were directed at exploring how
differences could be addressed. They included how to deal with
Muslim or Christian migrants who had been involved in the
religious war, he added.

"The model of the Feb. 11 to Feb. 12 meeting in Malino differs
from the Poso case because we will work from the differences
toward similarities."

Malino hosted similar talks between Muslim and Christian
leaders from Poso district in Central Sulawesi province. They
ended with an agreement to halt more than two years of
intermittent clashes there which left hundreds dead.

The Maluku representatives from the two sides had already held
a string of meetings in Maluku and in Makassar over the past few
weeks, during which, Farid said, several agreements had been
achieved.

The agreements, he added, included joint efforts to rebuild
public facilities such as schools, mosques and churches.

South Sulawesi Police Chief Insp. Gen. Firman Gani said he
would be providing stricter security for the talks in Malino than
for the earlier meeting to end the fighting in Poso.

He said that a total of 1,700 military and police personnel
have been deployed to guard the Maluku talks, 500 of whom would
be stationed in Malino.

The Maluku unrest broke out in Ambon following a trivial
dispute on Jan. 19, 1999. Apart from some 6,000 deaths, more than
half a million people were forced to flee their homes.