April 11, 2013
by Jim Della-Giacoma
1 Comment

Bahaya Kekerasan Komunal di Myanmar

Displaced Rohingya in Rakhine State. PHOTO: Evangelos Petratos/EU Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection/Flickr

Seminggu belakangan ini, Myanmar didera kekerasan komunal. Kali ini di jantung negeri dimana peristiwa terburuk terjadi di kota Meiktila yang terletak antara Mandalay dan ibukota Naypitaw. Awalnya sebuah perkelahian di toko emas, pertikaian ini kemudian meluas menjadi bentrok antara komunitas Budha dengan Muslim. Korbannya tak main-main. Menurut versi pemerintah, hampir 50 orang tewas dan tak kurang dari 10,000 terpaksa mengungsi. Sementara itu, perkiraan sumber lain menyebut bahwa korban melebihi estimasi pemerintah.

Seperti bentrokan sebelumnya, komunitas Muslim menderita paling banyak. Lebih dari tiga-perempat pengungsi beragama Islam. Sebagian rumah mereka hancur lebur dan sejumlah masjid serta madrasah hangus dibakar. Walau keadaan darurat telah berlaku dan keberadaan pasukan keamanan telah menenangkan suasana, para pengungsi mungkin butuh berminggu-minggu bahkan berbulan-bulan untuk dapat membangun rumah dan kehidupan mereka kembali. Mereka yang sudah kehilangan segalanya ini kini ada dalam ketakutan akan serangan berikutnya sehingga tidak dapat dipastikan kapan mereka mampu atau mau kembali ke kampungnya.

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March 28, 2013
by Jim Della-Giacoma
7 Comments

A Dangerous Resurgence of Communal Violence in Myanmar

Displaced Rohingya in Rakhine State. PHOTO: Evangelos Petratos/EU Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection/Flickr

This blog post is also available in Burmese and Indonesian.

Over the past week there has been more inter-communal violence in Myanmar, this time in the country’s heartland – with the worst incidents in the town of Meiktila, between Mandalay and the capital Naypyitaw. The incident started with a brawl in a gold shop and rapidly escalated into large-scale Buddhist-Muslim clashes that left nearly 50 people dead and over twelve thousand displaced, according to the latest government figures. Other credible estimates put the number of displaced even higher.

The Muslim community was the hardest hit, as it has tended to be in previous such clashes. More than three-quarters of those displaced were Muslims. Many of their homes were destroyed, and a number of religious buildings (mosques and madrassas) were burned down. Although a state of emergency and a visible presence of the security forces on the streets has restored calm, it will be weeks or months before the displaced can rebuild their homes and lives. And, given that most have lost everything – and are in fear of further attacks – there is uncertainty about how many of them would have the means or the confidence to return to their former neighbourhoods. Continue Reading →

January 31, 2013
by Achmad Sukarsono
1 Comment

Indonesia 2013: A Year of Voting Dangerously?

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono this week expressed concern that local elections would be a distraction from governing in Indonesia, not only in 2014, when his term ends, but also this year, when at least 144 positions for governor, bupati (district chief), and mayor could be contested. He fears that incumbents, challengers, police, civil servants and other officials administering one-third of the country might focus more on these campaigns rather than doing their jobs. But the consequence of what he calls “a year of politics and elections” is more treacherous than just an increase in already poor service delivery and chronic civil service absenteeism.

As some recently warned, these local elections could make 2013 a dangerous year. It was a prophecy quickly fulfilled when in the first major race of 2013 one local councillor was killed on 29 January on the day Papua province voted for a new governor. But while the weaknesses of the system are many and well known, there are some solutions. As Crisis Group first noted in December 2010 in our Preventing Violence in Local Elections report, national institutions need to play a more hands on role in local elections. Rather than just standing on the sidelines, they should fulfil their proper mandates by acting like a referee in these elections, heading off conflict, enforcing the law transparently and reducing the threat of deadly violence.

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January 10, 2013
by Jim Della-Giacoma
4 Comments

A serious threat to peace in Myanmar

The fighting in Kachin areas – the Kachin State itself and Kachin-majority parts of northern Shan State – has been one of the most serious threats to peace during Myanmar’s transition since it erupted in June 2011, ending a seventeen-year-long ceasefire. It remains the last of Myanmar’s decades-long ethnic conflicts not currently to have a ceasefire.

Since Crisis Group first raised concerns in November 2011 about the grave consequences the breakdown of the ceasefire could pose for the country’s New Peace Initiative, other Storm Clouds have gathered on the country’s horizon, including virulent inter-communal violence in Rakhine State. These are serious challenges that must be overcome if Myanmar is to keep its broadly positive transition on track. But as Myanmar can see from the Indonesian experience, transitions are complicated, long, and often messy processes. They do not always end up as those who advocated or started them intended. There are many deviations and frequently bumps in the road.

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December 13, 2012
by Jim Della-Giacoma
1 Comment

All we are saying is give ASEAN a chance

In recent weeks, it seems to have been on the talking points of officials in South East Asia to note all the progress in implementing the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ blueprints, codes of conduct, declarations, institutes, and mechanisms. While a seasonal flurry of statements came out of last month’s Phnom Penh summit, it is often hard to discern behind this jargon what progress is being made in promoting regional peace and security. Will all this “architecture” make ASEAN a “peace loving” grouping that is ready to reconcile its ten members’ many differences as well as those of its neighbours?

In trying to answer this question, two creations that came into being on 18 November at the 21^st ASEAN Summit are worth looking at a little more closely. One was mostly ignored; the other caught in the global spotlight.

To some, the ASEAN Institute of Peace and Reconciliation (AIPR) is an “exciting development”, but on paper it appears to be an anodyne body and not yet anything more than an additional acronym in meeting communiqués.

By way of contrast, the signing of the ASEAN Declaration of Human Rights (ADHR) did not pass unnoticed. It has been denounced as a deplorable document that contravenes the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and implies the more than 600 million people of the region are less deserving of human rights than those elsewhere.

Surin Pitsuwan, outgoing Secretary-General ASEAN. Photo: World Economic Forum/Sikarin Thanachaiary

Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa. Photo: CTBTO/Ed Wray

Some subtle points in two recent speeches by outgoing ASEAN Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan and Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa are also worth noting. Surin gave a final briefing in Jakarta on 26 November as his five-year term comes to end. Marty gave his annual address to the Jakarta Foreign Correspondents Club on 10 December. In January, the wordy former politician and Thai foreign minister hands over as Secretary-General to the far less quoted Le Luong Minh, a career diplomat from Vietnam. As the new secretary-general settles in ASEAN watchers are not expecting as much public reflection in the coming year, especially with taciturn Brunei taking over the rotating chairmanship.

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December 11, 2012
by Cillian Nolan
0 comments

“Trickery” and the rule of law in Timor-Leste

UNMIT Assists Timor-Leste Police Training. Photo: UN Photo/Martine Perret

The UN peacekeeping mission in Timor-Leste (UNMIT) is now in the final stages of its long-planned withdrawal. By the end of December, the only staff left will be packing up computers and dismantling the portable containers at its “Obrigado Barracks” headquarters. Following largely peaceful presidential and parliamentary elections earlier this year, Timorese are in confident spirits about the many challenges ahead. But after thirteen years of UN presence in the country, it is natural that there is some apprehension among some about security after the end of peace operations.

The Parliamentary Majority Alliance (AMP) coalition government in office from 2007-12 never found in the UN a fitting partner for reform. It saw more value in devising and implementing its own solutions. This was most notable in its response to the displacement that followed the 2006 crisis. While the UN favoured a phased, sustainable, decade-long approach to returning tens of thousands in IDP camps, the government instead handed out up to $4500 to households and closed the camps in two years. When then President José Ramos-Horta was shot in February 2008, UNMIT’s response was criticised as slow and clumsy. The government quickly set up a joint army-police command to handle security, just as UNMIT was supposed to be articulating clearer divisions between the two forces. Pragmatic fixes have trumped long-term and deeper reforms as they have been seen to deliver quick results.

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October 3, 2012
by Achmad Sukarsono
1 Comment

Showing True Colours: Identity Politics in Indonesia’s Local Elections

The four pairs who ran for posts of Governor and Deputy Governor of West Kalimantan. Source: KPU Kalimantan Barat

Identity politics is still important in Indonesian elections even though poll organisers have discouraged it and candidates have vowed to stay away from it. Without enforcement, sanction or more self-discipline, it will continue to flourish – until it backfires.

On 20 September, voters cast their ballots in three high-profile local elections – the Jakarta gubernatorial race and two polls in West Kalimantan province. They pierced their ballots after candidates canvassed their votes by putting on display their ethnic, racial and religious colours. In Kalimantan, the Dayak candidate wore the distinctive cultural motive on his jacket, Muslims wore the peci, the one-time nationalist cap now associated with their religion. A week later, the official results showed two contrasting trends making it unclear whether identity politics is a potent strategy or merely a bad move to save a desperate campaign.

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September 11, 2012
by Cillian Nolan
1 Comment

Votes in the bag? The noken system and conflict in Indonesian Papua

A barefoot Papuan tribes woman fills her ballot at a polling center Jayapura in eastern Papua province on July 8, 2009. AFP PHOTO/BANJIR AMBARITA

Indonesia’s system of direct local elections remains relatively young and in flux. Since their introduction in 2005, a number of changes at national level have broadly sought to strengthen the role of elections commissions in administering elections; results have been mixed. The system remains under review, with some in government even pushing to roll back direct local polls. A practice of voting by consensus, customary in some areas of the Papuan highlands, is one anomaly that deserves greater attention. Known colloquially as the noken system after the traditional bag made from bark that highlanders carry, its application varies and it is not covered by either national or provincial electoral regulations. Noken involves the divvying up of votes at village level by community members through consensus. Traditionally, voters may have placed these votes in a noken bag. A case brought to Indonesia’s Constitutional Court by a losing pair of candidates in the Puncak Jaya district has highlighted the problems with this system and underlined the broader issue of weak government in the easternmost province.

In our recent report, Indonesia: Dynamics of Violence in Papua, we looked at how one factor that can play a role in putting the brakes on conflict in Indonesia—strong local government—is largely absent in Papua, the country’s most violent province. There is much frustration among Papuans about the failure of the 2001 special autonomy law, which many had hoped would strengthen their role in local decision-making. But in the absence of a coordinated strategy or good faith effort by either Jakarta or provincial lawmakers in Jayapura to strengthen special autonomy, the cause has provided cover for a number of self-interested ploys by local politicians. Continue Reading →

September 10, 2012
by Jim Della-Giacoma
2 Comments

Apa yang bisa dipelajari Myanmar dari Indonesia? Perjanjian Malino

Seorang pria dari etnis Rakhine sedang memegang senjata rakitan di depan rumah yang terbakar setelah bentrok antara kelompok Rakhine yang beragama Budha dan komunitas Muslim Rohingya. Photo: Reuters

This post is also available in English and Burmese.

Mengapa kekerasan meletus di Poso, Sulawesi Tengah antara tahun 1998-2001 merupakan sebuah cerita panjang yang dijelaskan dalam laporan kami Indonesia Backgrounder: Jihad in Central Sulawesi. Bagaimana kemudian konflik di Poso bisa dihentikan mungkin layak untuk dikaji demi kebaikan komisi yang baru saja dibentuk oleh Presiden Myanmar Thein Sein untuk menginvestigasi kekerasan antar suku yang terjadi baru-baru ini di Negara Bagian Arakan.

Pertikaian di Poso yang berlangsung dari tahun 1998 hingga 2001 merupakan bagian dari sebuah gelombang konflik antara Muslim dan Kristen yang melanda kepulauan Maluku dan Sulawesi yang pecah setelah rezim pemerintahan otoriter yang telah berkuasa selama lebih dari 30 tahun berakhir dengan lengsernya Presiden Soeharto. Dalam serangkaian insiden-insiden kekerasan yang terjadi, ratusan orang tewas dan ribuan rumah dibakar sementara kedua komunitas saling bertempur dalam ketegangan antara kelompok Muslim dan Kristen yang seringkali diperburuk dengan keterlibatan jihadis Muslim. Continue Reading →

September 4, 2012
by Jim Della-Giacoma
4 Comments

What could Myanmar learn from Indonesia? The Malino Accord

An ethnic Rakhine man holds homemade weapons as he stands in front of a house that was burnt during fighting between Buddhist Rakhine and Muslim Rohingya communities. Photo: Reuters

This post is also available in Indonesian and Burmese.

Why violence broke out in Poso, Central Sulawesi in 1998-2001 is a long story recounted in our Indonesia Backgrounder: Jihad in Central Sulawesi. How it was stopped might be worth examining for the benefit of the recently formed 27-member commission set up by Myanmar’s President Thein Sein to investigate recent inter-communal violence in Arakan State.

The fighting in Poso between 1998 and 2001 was part of a broad sweep of conflicts between Muslims and Christians in the Maluku Islands and on the island of Sulawesi that took place after Indonesia itself lifted the lid off more than 30 years of authoritarian rule with the resignation of President Soeharto. In a series of incidents, hundreds were killed and thousands of homes burnt as communities turned on each other with deadly results in inter-communal tensions often made more virulent by the involvement of Muslim Jihadis. Continue Reading →