Australia reaffirms support for Jakarta's Aceh war

BY IGGY KIM

In the face of mounting casualties and humanitarian crisis in Aceh, foreign minister Alexander Downer reaffirmed Canberra's support for Jakarta's war.

Speaking to CNN during the recent ASEAN regional forum, Downer stated that "the Indonesians have a right to deal with organisations that mount militant acts against their own people", referring to the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

The ASEAN ministers also released a communiqu‚ reaffirming "our support for the sovereignty, territorial integrity and national unity of Indonesia".

Downer's comment is only the latest in Canberra's consistent opposition to Aceh's right to self-determination.

In November 2000, following the million-strong pro-referendum demonstrations in Aceh, Downer told CNN his government rejected the call for a United Nations-supervised referendum on self-determination.

"This is a matter that Indonesia needs to resolve itself", Downer said.

This is consistent with Australia's long support for Indonesian "territorial integrity" at all costs, going back to Liberal PM John Gorton's support for Indonesia's formal annexation of West Papua in 1969 and Labor PM Gough Whitlam's support for the invasion of East Timor in 1975.

"The falling out over East Timor in 1999 was forced on Canberra by the mass solidarity demonstrations. Downer has been sweating over how to rebuild relations with Indonesia ever since. This is why Canberra is so keen to not just overlook, but actively help gloss over, the TNI's atrocities in Aceh", said Pip Hinman, national coordinator of Action in Solidarity with Asia and the Pacific.

For details of ASAP's Aceh solidarity campaign, visit < http://A HREF="www.asia-pacific-action.org"><www.asia-pacific-action.org>.

From Green Left Weekly, June 25, 2003.

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From GLW issue 543