U.S. Senate's move on arms ban to RI deplored

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia said yesterday it was unhappy with the U.S Senate's plan to tie the sales of light weapons to Indonesia with conditions in East Timor.

"We're unhappy that foreign aid should be linked to unrelated matters like human rights," Irawan Abidin, director of information at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs told The Jakarta Post yesterday.

The Senate voted on Tuesday to ban the sale of light arms to Indonesia until it sees "significant progress" in East Timor, according to an AFP dispatch from Washington.

The bill will now go to a House-Senate conference committee to resolve differences with a similar version of the bill already passed by the House of Representatives in May.

Included as a provision in the Foreign Assistance Appropriations Bill, the Senate's new measure recommended that the U.S. government "refrain from selling light arms and crowd control items until the Secretary of State reports that there has been significant progress made on human rights in East Timor and elsewhere in Indonesia".

The recommendations also called on Jakarta to participate "constructively" with United Nations Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali on resolving the status of East Timor, which includes the issue of self-determination.

Irawan said, however, that the bill has some way to go before it is fully approved by the congress and that things could still change between now and then.

Even if it is approved, there is still the possibility that the bill might be vetoed by the U.S. president.

Indonesia has repeatedly rejected U.S. attempts in the past to link foreign aid with political conditions -- such as the East Timor situation, human rights and labor rights -- calling the move an attempt to interfere in its domestic affairs.

Military officials have responded to the threat of a U.S. arms sales ban by saying that Indonesia was prepared to switch to other arms suppliers.

The U.S. congress succeeded in scrapping further military training facilities for Indonesian officers in 1992. Indonesia responded by sending its officers to Australian military colleges.

Washington last year succeeded in blocking Jordan's plan to sell U.S. built F-5 jetfighters to Indonesia on human rights grounds. (pwn)