Unexpected promise: disaster creates an opening for peace in a conflict-riven land.

AuthorRenner, Michael
PositionAceh connected after Tsunami

Aceh--For centuries, this territory at the northern tip of Sumatra was at the crossroads of several of the world's major cultures and trade routes, leading some to say that Aceh really stands for Arabia-China-Europe-Hindustan. It was there that Islam was first introduced to the vast Indonesian archipelago in the 8th century. Later, an independent sultanate emerged that lasted for some five centuries.

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Open to foreign influences, the Acehnese have nonetheless been fiercely independent-minded. This was as true when a Portuguese fleet was defeated in 1614 as it was during Dutch efforts to impose colonial rule between 1873 and 1942. After World War II, Aceh became part of Indonesia. But excessive centralization and unjust exploitation of its resources by Jakarta led to the founding of the separatist Gerakan Aceh Merdeka (GAM, or Free Aceh Movement) in 1976. Although the initial rebellion was quickly crushed, atrocities committed by government troops fueled resentment among the Acehnese and ensured a prolonged struggle. During the 1990s and again in 2003, the province was put under martial law (see sidebar, "Conflict and Peacemaking," opposite page.)

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It took the enormous devastation of the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 26, 2004, to break Aceh's punitive isolation. In a matter of mere minutes, close to 170,000 people perished--more than ten times as many as had been killed during the 29 years of secessionist conflict. Against the wishes of military hardliners, newly elected Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono accepted international emergency assistance. An intense global spotlight was trained on Aceh as foreign aid workers and reporters flooded in.

Yudhoyono had pledged during his election campaign to bring peace to Aceh, and there were secret efforts just prior to the tsunami to resolve the conflict. But the tsunami's killer waves triggered a more decisive mood of reconciliation. Facilitated by the Crisis Management Initiative headed by former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, five rounds of talks led to a peace agreement, known as the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), which was signed in August 2005. In a nutshell, GAM abandoned its goal of independence in return for assurances of human rights, amnesty, reintegration of combatants, and a greater degree of self-government and democratization.

Silencing the Guns

On a sweltering morning in December 2005, I watched six proud young men march onto Blang Padang sports field in the heart of the provincial capital, Banda Aceh. Former GAM fighters, they were clad in black uniforms and matching berets and held assault rifles across their chests. They were met by six other men in white baseball caps emblazoned with the initials AMM--Aceh Monitoring Mission. The AMM monitors, drawn from European and Southeast Asian nations, were in Aceh to oversee the implementation of the peace deal. On cue, the guerrillas handed over their guns, and the monitors proceeded to cut the weapons apart with power saws.

The six guns were the last of 840 weapons handed over by GAM fighters emerging from their mountain and jungle redoubts. In parallel, Jakarta withdrew thousands of soldiers and policemen from the province--non-local units that had been brought in to enforce martial law and that had distinguished themselves mostly by their brutality toward civilians. Given failed earlier peace efforts, some observers doubted that the terms of the peace agreement would be honored by the protagonists. But the first phase of Aceh's peace process, from September to December 2005, was an outstanding success.

GAM's official representative at the decommissioning ceremony was Irwandi Yusuf. A small man with an intense gaze, Yusuf was a political prisoner when the tsunami hit and only narrowly escaped drowning. He referred to the weapons as "our friends," but went on to say that the time had come to rely on "finer tools" to build a free and flourishing society. A year later, he is now GAM's candidate for Aceh governor.

His government counterpart in overseeing the weapons decommissioning and troop withdrawal, Major General Bambang Darmono, was grim-faced throughout the Banda Aceh ceremony, flashing a smile only when he triumphantly hoisted a plaque on which the last cut-up gun was mounted. Once the operational military commander in Aceh and a proponent of a merciless iron-fist policy, he was put in charge of the military's relief efforts after the tsunami before becoming the government's point man in the disarmament process. GAM spokesman Bakhtiar Abdullah told me that Darmono's involvement in the peace process had in fact eased his hardline views--a softening of attitudes that is critical for peace.

Silencing the guns and taming the military's opposition to peace have been major achievements. But multiple challenges remain on the road to lasting peace. Physical rebuilding and peace-building are closely intertwined challenges. The political process has barely started. Economic revival is essential for giving people a stake in peace.

Politics and Accountability

Around nightfall one evening the group I traveled with, organized by San Francisco-based Global Exchange, pulled up at a humble village cafe not far from the industrial town of Lhokseumawe. Word of foreign visitors spread fast, and we were quickly surrounded by a few dozen men, women, and children. When they realized that we wanted to hear about their experience during the conflict, everyone pressed even closer. The villagers eagerly took turns relating tales of abuse they had suffered--beatings, kidnappings, killings, as well as theft and extortion, at the hands of Indonesian military and police.

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Their stories opened a window into the deep...

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