---------------------------------------------------------- Visit Indonesia Daily News Online HomePage: http://www.indo-news.com/ Please Visit Our Sponsor http://www.indo-news.com/cgi-bin/ads1 ---------------------------------------------------------- International help sought to end Aceh violence By Vithoon Amorn BANGKOK, July 24 (Reuters) - A meeting to discuss ways of ending strife in Indonesia's Aceh province heard calls on Saturday for international mediation in the conflict. The one-day meeting in Bangkok in the wake of an upsurge of violence in the province at the northern tip of the island of Sumatra was attended by representatives of the rebel Free Aceh movement and observers sent by the province's governor. Ibrahim Abdullah, head of the five observers, proposed a dialogue between the government and the rebels with international representatives acting as mediators. ``All fighting must be stopped immediately and then let's have open dialogue among us. I am sure that this dialogue will take maybe years and years but it will be much more superior than if we have to fight and kill the innocent,'' he told the meeting. Officials of the International Forum for Aceh, one of the meeting's organisers, said Abdullah made the remarks in a personal capacity and they should not be regarded as government views. The observers were making a brief stopover in Thailand's capital on their way to Sweden where they may meet Hasan Tiro, the exiled leader of the Free Aceh movement, the officials told Reuters. More than 100 people have been killed in clashes between Indonesian troops and Aceh rebels in the past three months. Zaini Abdullah, Tiro's most senior representative at the meeting, said people in Aceh had a right of self determination. ``We hereby urgently call on the world community...to intervene and assist the Acehnese in their legitimate struggle to regain their independence that was illegally transferred by the Dutch to the Javanese-Indonesian neo-colonialist regime,'' he said. Free Aceh rebels last Monday killed five members of the security forces. Human rights groups say about 2,000 people have been killed during a nine-year government crackdown on the rebels. Indonesia's June 7 election, its first democratic vote since 1955, was boycotted in much of the province. Shalahuddin Alfata, a senior member of the Moslem-backed United Development Party elected to represent Aceh in June, said only international mediators could stop the bloodshed. ``Neither Acehnese nor Indonesians can solve this problem unless we invited the international community to be a mediator,'' he said, adding the United States, Japan and Britain could also play a role in restoring peace because of their substantial business interests in Indonesia. ``I say this to the international community, please try to be a mediator between us. If you don't want to do it, please supply us with weapons so we can fight equally for another 100 years,'' Alfata told the meeting. Carmel Budiardjo from the London-based Indonesian human rights group TAPOL called on the Indonesian government to withdraw troops from Aceh. She also proposed that the government launch investigations into past military crackdowns and atrocities against Aceh civilians. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Didistribusikan tgl. 24 Jul 1999 jam 20:24:56 GMT+1 oleh: Indonesia Daily News Online <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.Indo-News.com/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
