The RI-Japan car talks

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