The Indonesian government will send a senior representative to Geneva next month to re-open peace talks with the exiled leadership of separatist rebels in the troubled province of Aceh, reports said Saturday.
The Jakarta Post said the decision to send Coordinating Security Minister Agum Gumelar to Geneva for the July 1 talks was taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by Vice President Megawati Sukarnoputri on Friday.
Megawati, known for her strong stance against separatism, is first in line to replace embattled President Abdurrahman Wahid should a hostile parliament succeed in its efforts to impeach him in the coming months.
Defense Minister Mohammad Mahfud was quoted as saying after the cabinet meeting that Gumelar would be accompanied by Hassan Wirayuda, the ministry of foreign affairs' director general for political affairs, at the two-day meeting scheduled for July 2-3.
But in Aceh, Colonel Teuku Djohan Basyar, a government representative on the Joint Committee for Security Issues (JCSI) set up by both sides last year, told AFP the Geneva meeting would be June 30-July 1.
There was no immediate explanation for the discrepancy in the dates.
Separately, Teungku Nashiruddin, the spokesman for the rebel Free Aceh Movement (GAM) on the JCSI told AFP he had been informed of the Geneva peace talks by the group's exiled leadership in Sweden.
GAM had agreed to attend, he said.
"The agenda of the next meeting will focus on the implementation of agreements already reached," Nahsiruddin said, adding that a main goal of the talks would be ways to halt the escalating violence in which some 800 people have died this year alone.
Talks with the GAM were initiated by Wahid and facilitated by the Swiss-based Henri Dunant Center, which is still acting as the go-between in the talks.
They foundered and broke off late last year after a series of flawed truces failed to end the bloodshed in the oil-rich province on the northern tip of Sumatra island where the GAM has been fighting for an independent state since the mid 1970s.
Jakarta in April branded GAM an outlaw movement, and sent more than 1,000 fresh troops to Aceh to launch an offensive, resulting in a sharp escalation of the violence.
Gumelar announced Wednesday the government was ready to accept an invitation from the Henry Dunant Center, but at the time gave no indication talks were imminent or that he would lead the delegation.
The previous talks in 2000 were considered controversial by many in Jakarta because they implied recognition of GAM at the diplomatic level. The highest Jakarta representative has always been Wirayuda.
There was no immediate indication as to who would lead the delegation from GAM, whose leader Hasan Tiro lives in exile in Sweden, at the new talks.
But Nashiruddin repeated the GAM position that that, "If Jakarta insists on ruling out Aceh independence, while GAM wants independence, the Aceh problem can never be solved."
The way to resolve the issue would be a UN-administered referendum on self-determination, he told AFP -- JAKARTA (AFP)
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
