Simply to remind Amien Rais

Simply to remind Amien Rais

In his letter of Jan. 15, 2000, On call for jihad, Haris
Adriansyah wondered what my precise target was beside criticizing
Amien Rais personally. My only target is simply to make Amien
Rais think about his political commitment as a nonsectarian
national leader.

It is Amien Rais' job to urge the government to take stern
action to stop the prolonged bloodshed in Maluku. However, he
should not take sides with one of the two conflicting parties,
which might incite people to take more harsh action against each
other. As Speaker of the People's Consultative Assembly, Amien
Rais is expected to calm down any communal conflict, and at the
same time seek a peaceful and amicable resolution.

I share Haris Adriansyah's deep concern about thousands of
people in Maluku who have been badly suffering from communal
violence over the last year. Hence, the most urgent thing to do
is to end the violence, then follow this with legal action
against those who were involved in orchestrating the conflict and
violence. In this regard, I agree with President Abdurrahman
Wahid's stance that dispatching people to Maluku will likely
create more problems.

BENNY SUBIANTO

Jakarta