DATE=5/12/2000
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=ACEH CEASEFIRE ANTICIPATION (L-ONLY)
NUMBER=2-262261
BYLINE=BRONWYN CURRAN
DATELINE=BANDA ACEH
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: Police in Indonesia's insurgent Aceh province
have vowed to cease activities
targetting separatist rebels, as the rebels and the
Indonesian government prepare to sign an historic
peace accord in Switzerland. Bronwyn Curran has this
report from the province's capital, Banda Aceh.
TEXT:
/// ACT--SFX PRAYER CHANTS, FADE DOWN & UNDER ///
In schools and mosques across this staunchly Muslim
province, prayers for Friday's peace accord have
already begun.
The memorandum of understanding between the rebel Free
Aceh Movement and Indonesia's government is aimed at
ending decades of violence.
It is the closest the two sides have come to laying
down arms in a quarter of a century of insurgency and
counter-insurgency operations that have cost thousands
of lives.
Rebel leaders say the peace accord will come into
effect in two weeks, and is to last three months.
They have issued a statement in Aceh saying they are
scaling back their activities in advance of Friday's
signing.
At the same time Aceh's police chief Brigadier-General
Bachrumsyah, the top security commander in the
province, has declared his total support for the peace
accord.
He has announced he has ordered the 10-thousand police
under his control in Aceh to halt activities which
target the rebels.
/// ACT BACHRUMSYAH (IN INDONESIAN ///
We're already practicing activities which are aimed at
a more conducive situation. In the interests of a
conducive situation, we will no longer mount
activities against the Free Aceh rebels. However we
will continue to arrest civilians carrying illegal
weapons.
/// END ACT///
However the Police commander added that he has yet to
receive any instructions from Jakarta to wind up a
special police counter-insurgency
operation, which has been in force since February this
year.
Brigadier-General Bachrumsyiah says he is unaware of
any details of Friday's agreement, nor has he been
consulted on it, but he has vowed to implement
whatever the government of Abdurrahman Wahid agrees
to, for the sake of peace in Aceh.
A spokesman for the separatist rebels said last week
that under the agreement, all soldiers and police not
native to Aceh would be withdrawn from the province.
This has long been a demand of the rebels.
The Wahid government has been anxious to deny the
agreement amounts to a formal ceasefire, preferring to
call it a commitment to reduce the level of violence.
Both sides say the agreement is a first step towards
opening dialogue on Aceh's political future.
The Free Aceh rebels say they will continue to press
their demand for independence from Indonesia -- an
option President Wahid has repeatedly ruled out,
offering instead greater autonomy, the right to impose
Islamic shariat
law, and a greater share of revenue from the
province's rich oil and gas reserves. (SIGNED)
NEB/BC/FC/PLM
11-May-2000 23:43 PM EDT (12-May-2000 0343 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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