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FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue cover dated November 8, 2001
Intelligence - US Cautious With Indonesian Ties
Mixed Blessings For Indonesia
The U.S. Senate has signalled that it wants Washington to move cautiously in resuming ties with Indonesia's armed forces. But the Senate, in its new Foreign Operations Bill, increased its budget for bilateral aid to Indonesia in 2002 from about $115 million to $130 million. The bill, which cleared the Senate in late October, introduces several new conditions before the United States and Indonesia can resume military relations.
These conditions include punishing those involved in the murder of three humanitarian aid workers in West Timor in September 2000, allowing civilian officials to audit receipts and expenditures of the armed forces, granting international humanitarian-aid workers access to West Timor, Aceh, West Papua and the Moluccas and releasing political detainees.
These conditions were added to earlier restrictions on military training and aid imposed in the wake of the violence that followed East Timor's vote for independence in 1999. "We wanted to send two clear messages," says an aide to Democrat Senator Patrick Leahy, who spearheaded these moves. "We want to be supportive on the economic side, but we want to go slow on the military side because we have yet to see any real sign that the military is reforming itself."
The Pentagon, meanwhile, wants closer military cooperation to help in the war on terrorism. Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told the REVIEW the U.S. believes the terrorist Al Qaeda organization has a significant presence there.
Copyright ©2001 Review Publishing Company Limited, Hong Kong. All rights reserved.
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