Step Vaessen; 27/5/08
Freedom was the rallying call of the mass protests in Indonesia that toppled Suharto from the presidency in 1998. Many of the thousands of political opponents imprisoned under his rule were released after his fall, but 10 years on, people are once again being jailed for expressing their opinions. Al Jazeera’s gets access to interview a man sentenced a few weeks ago to life in prison for waving a separatist flag. Locked up for life for waving a flag, independence activist Johan Teterissa is Indonesia’s latest political prisoner. The 45-year-old Ambonese man managed to get past heavy security when Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Indonesia’s president, visited the island last June and unfurled the Ambonese independence flag in his face. Teterissa was immediately arrested, charged with subversion and sentenced to life in prison. And pictures indicate he was not treated kindly. “I was seriously beaten up, they even put a grenade in my mouth. They treated me as if I was a dangerous killer,” Teterissa says.
See: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/5FFDF8F9-6229-42A7-9F7C-D366E7C9E9FA.htm
Aceh survivors struggle to rebuild
Claudia Theophilus; 26/5/08
Ten years ago, much of Indonesia’s Aceh province was a no-go area where Indonesian troops and Free Aceh Movement separatists struggled for control. These days Aceh is held up as a model for the country’s future, where differences are tolerated and embraced and where autonomy and democracy can work. But almost three years after a peace deal ended the three-decade bloody conflict between soldiers and separatists, residents of the oil-rich province in northern Sumatra say little has changed. The 2004 Indian ocean tsunami that killed 130,000 people, left close to 40,000 missing and displaced an estimated half a million in Aceh acted as a catalyst that led to the Helsinki peace agreement. This is where Free Aceh Movement (GAM) fighters agreed to lay down arms in return for political power and self-determination, and control of the province’s resources.
See: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/6DD8A4C9-143E-4850-98A2-D5860D088F1B.htm
