Tempo Interactive

Adi Warsidi, Banda Aceh - The number of cases of human
rights violations in Aceh following the signing of the
Helsinki agreement between the Indonesian government and
the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) has declined.

“Perhaps this is because there is peace and all parties
respect the peace agreement”, said M. Isa, the head of the
data division of the Coalition of Non-Government
Organisations on Human Rights - Aceh, when speaking with
Tempo in Thursday October 27.

This decline in human rights violations continued Isa, has
occurred not only in terms of quantity but also in quality.
Even when human rights violations do occur, in general they
are limited to minor cases such as threats which do not
result in the loss of life - demand for taxes, illegal
payments and extortion which are being committed by certain
parties.

“In the past, many of the cases that occurred were murders,
forced disappearances and abductions. [So] in fact the
minor cases occurring in the past were not very conspicuous
and [therefore] not monitored”, said Isa.

According to Isa, this decline is evidence of the many
parties that can uphold the peace agreement in Aceh. Isa
hopes that over the next period there will be no more human
rights violations in Aceh.

During the period of civil emergency, the organisation
recorded hundreds of cases of human rights violations in
Aceh. They recorded 623 people who were victims of gross
human rights violations such as abuse/injury,
abductions/disappearances and arrests. Out of these, 231
were members of GAM, the military/police and civilians who
died during this period.