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Indonesia Will Take years To Subdue Aceh Rebellion: Official
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A Indonesian soldier takes cover behind a tree during operations
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Additional
Reporting By Kazi Mahmood, IOL Southeast Asia Correspondent
Kuala
Lumpur (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – With ferocious
battles between Indonesian forces and fighters of the Free Aceh
Movement (GAM) have been raging since 1976 for independence and an
estimated 10,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed since
then, officials and experts said the military will take years to
subdue "the rebels."
Indonesia's
military said Tuesday, July 8, it had killed 21 GAM fighters within 24
hours in Aceh province in one of the bloodiest days since an all-out
assault was launched in mid-May against the GAM.
Indonesia’s
military chief, chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto said that the military
operation may take more than a year before it could root out the GAM,
whereas Muhamad Isa Selamat, a well known writer in Malaysia, said the
war might break Indonesia’s republic into pieces.
Speaking
to reporters Sunday, July 8, Sutarto said that he believed the
Indonesian army, however, would emerge victorious in the end of the
day, adding that he could say that the military operation would not be
completed within six months.
"No
country in this world has carried out an operation against rebels in
just six months," he told reporters on Sunday in the northern
city of Lhokesumawe.
"The
military operation could take a year, two years or even 10
years," he added.
Selamat
sees eye-to-eye with Sutarto that the war would not end in a year or
even 10 years, stating that Indonesia might have enlisted itself in
its own Vietnam and that this could well send the republic to its
death bed.
"Aceh
may still break off from Indonesia after the military victory
there…there is still the election process to go and we have to
expect terrorist style or geurilla style attacks on the 'Javanese'
civilian administration in Aceh after the war," he said.
"This
could drag the entire nation in a battle of attrition and drain the
resources of the province and of the country into a total failure of
the integration of Aceh into Indonesia," added the writer from
Riau.
The
writer joined other Islamic personalities including those from the
influential Muhamadiyah saying that the war was a failure and that
imposing the "Javanization" of Aceh on the Acehnese people
could be a terrible mistake.
'Failure'
The
National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), finally labeled the
military operation a failure as it had only increased the number of
civilian casualties.
In
the early stages of the war, the Komnas HAM declared its support for
the government saying that the war was an internal matter and that
Indonesia could not break up due to the revolt in Aceh.
Meanwhile,
Indonesia's military said Tuesday troops shot six GAM members in a
clash at Cot Badak in Bireuen district on Monday and another four at
Alue Peune later the same day, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
"In
North Aceh district, troops killed 10 rebels in separate clashes at
five locations on Monday. Another rebel was shot dead by troops at
Rawadua in South Aceh district during a clash on Monday,"
military operation spokesman Ahmad Yani Basuki said.
Basuki
also said the body of a man shot dead in North Aceh on Sunday has been
identified as Halim bin Yasin, 40, GAM's local deputy military
commander.
Basuki
said suspected rebels at Samalangan in Bireuen district on Monday shot
dead a female fighter, who had surrendered to the authorities.
The
gunshot-riddled body of a man was found in Bireuen on Monday and
another was found early Tuesday in North Aceh district, he said.
According
to military figures, 374 rebels have been killed since the operation
was launched on May 19 for the loss of 30 soldiers and eight police.
GAM
says many of those killed are civilians
The
human rights group the Commission on Missing Persons and Victims of
Violence (Kontras) said on June 21 that up to 170 civilians were
killed in the first month of Indonesia's military offensive
against GAM fighters in Aceh province.
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