Storm over Indonesian arms sales

Storm over Indonesian arms sales

By Paul Clarke

Britain's Conservative government is facing a growing row over its decision to sell 24 Hawk ground attack planes to Indonesia. Hawks have already been extensively used by Indonesian forces against Fretilin liberation fighters in East Timor.

The storm comes in the wake of the February 22 nationwide TV showing of John Pilger's film about Timor, Death of a Nation.

Pilger allowed the phone number of the Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) to be flashed at the end of the film. Despite the late hour (the movie finished at 12.15am), calls flooded in at 4000 per minute. British Telecom said 100,000 people attempted to phone the campaign within 48 hours.

Public protest over arms sales to Indonesia comes at a bad time for Prime Minister John Major. His government is already under fierce attack over an "aid for arms sales" deal with Malaysia, negotiated by his predecessor, Margaret Thatcher. This involved raiding Britain's meagre overseas development fund, giving A$480 million to help build the ecologically damaging Pergua dam in Kelantan state.

In return Britain got a œ1 billion arms deal — again including Hawk bombers. In addition to cash for the dam, œ60 million was donated to Malaysia's ruling UMNO Baru party to secure the arms deal.

Until the showing of Pilger's film, the Timor issue was virtually unknown in Britain. Now a major protest is planned outside the London annual shareholders' meeting of British Aerospace on April 26.

London CAAT coordinator Will MacMahon told Green Left: "John Pilger's film has woken people up to Britain's role in the Timor tragedy. Claims by John Major that Hawk bombers are just 'training' aircraft and will not be used against the people of East Timor have fooled nobody."

From GLW issue 137