What have we achieved?

What have we achieved?

After two days of talks about the domestic problem of Aceh,
held in a foreign country, under the umbrella of the Henry Dunant
Center, and attended by people from the U.S., Great Britain,
Thailand and other countries, Indonesia has achieved nothing
concrete. We have been taught by our chief negotiator to respect
God's creatures, but fundamental topics like a cease-fire and the
acceptance that Aceh is part and will stay part of the Republic
of Indonesia are still up in the air. Even the autonomy law (for
Aceh) will only be used as a starting point for an all-inclusive
dialog in the year 2003 or 2004.

So the victory, as in previous talks, is on the side of the
Free Aceh Movement (GAM), and the only thing the Republic can do
is hide this political defeat by pointing to the shortcomings the
central government must take steps to overcome, which are:

* The government must act more generously.

* The government must bring about solid coordination between the
relevant departments, because we need the support of every single
Indonesian.

* The military should be reformed because it plays an important
role, both negatively and positively.

From the explanation of our chief negotiator, I got the
impression that GAM has done nothing wrong. The Indonesian
government even plans to capitulate to GAM by considering the
possibility of reducing troop numbers in Aceh. I am happy to read
that the military chief, Adm. Widodo, refused to give any comment
on this subject.

I have the feeling that the foreign minister is also not too
happy with the results of the talks, saying that Indonesia may
halt future peace talks with GAM (The Jakarta Post, May 11) if
GAM insists on separation from the Republic. It is very difficult
to understand the patience of my government, which despite
several rounds of talks in the past without any results that
benefit the people of Aceh, still wants to talk instead of taking
tough measures.

SOEGIH ARTO

Jakarta