The RI-Japan car talks

The bilateral talks last Monday and Tuesday between Indonesia and Japan on the Indonesian national car manufacturing program are over. Although our team of negotiators, led by Minister of Industry and Trade Tunky Ariwibowo, tried hard to explain the reason for launching the program, the talks failed to achieve a meeting of minds. The Japanese, who base their stance on the principles of free trade, commitment to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Bogor Declaration, seem unable to accept the reasons given by Indonesia for launching Presidential Instruction No.2/1996.

With the breakdown of this second round of talks (the first was held in Tokyo two weeks before) the question we are asking ourselves is whether Japan will bring the issue to the attention of the WTO. This is something we must prevent. Although under the post-GATT world economic order a mechanism does indeed exist to file complaints with the WTO, we would prefer to resolve this matter on a bilateral basis.

We hope that in the third round of talks Japan will be able to understand the Indonesian position because the Presidential Instruction is of the greatest importance to our national interests, particularly to lessen our dependence on the import of cars from Japan, which puts a strain on our foreign exchange reserves.

If Japan feels concerned about this program it is because of the investments which they have made here in cooperation with local partners. In the last several years a great number of factories have been built by them at a total investment of billions of dollars. We hope the third round of negotiations in Tokyo will bring a meeting of minds so that no one will be harmed.

-- Jawa Pos, Surabaya