Indonesia's foreign minister expressed
frustration with Myanmar's lack of human rights and democracy, but
said the U.S. approach of harsh sanctions only leads to more
hardship among the country's people.
Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda also called on the military
government in Myanmar, which is also known as Burma, to release
detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi immediately.
He said, however, that Indonesia believes Myanmar's neighbors
should engage with the junta even more closely, a position at odds
with the traditional U.S. policy favoring tough sanctions meant to
force the generals to respect human rights and release thousands of
imprisoned political activists.
Wirajuda met Monday with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham
Clinton, whose State Department is reviewing U.S. policy toward
Myanmar, where the military has ruled since 1962.
The meeting came as Suu Kyi faced a trial widely seen as an
excuse for the ruling junta to keep the popular Nobel Peace laureate
detained through elections planned for next year.
Clinton, who traveled in February to Jakarta, praised Indonesia
for urging Myanmar to release Suu Kyi. "The charges against her are
baseless, and we call for her immediate release," Clinton said.
Wirajuda did not mention U.S. sanctions against Myanmar during a
joint press conference with Clinton after their private talks. But,
speaking earlier at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace,
he said tough sanctions "make the local people suffer even more."
He called on the world to help alleviate their hardships. "This
would encourage Myanmar to be more open," he said.
Indonesia has been heartened, Wirajuda said, by the Obama
administration's willingness to talk with governments at odds with
the United States.
While some governments in Southeast Asia have faulted U.S. and
European sanctions, rights groups have complained about Myanmar's
neighbors' traditional aversion to criticizing the junta. They have
urged the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations, of which
Myanmar and Indonesia are members, to more firmly press the generals
to end rights abuses and the detention of thousands of political
prisoners.
Wirajuda said Myanmar's elections next year must be credible and
include Suu Kyi's political party. Indonesia, he said, has told
Myanmar that it will be closely following Suu Kyi's case.
It has been 19 years since Suu Kyi's party won a landslide
victory at the ballot box but was prevented from taking office. She
has been detained without trial for more than 13 of the past 19
years, including the last six.
In the current trial, Suu Kyi has been charged with violating the
terms of her house arrest because an uninvited American man swam
secretly to her closely guarded lakeside home and stayed for two
days.
Expectations are high that she will be found guilty since
Myanmar's courts operate under the command of the military.
Separately, Wirajuda said that the problem in Indonesia's remote
Papua province, where rebels are seeking independence, is that there
is "too much power in the hands of the local authorities, too much
money."
He said local officials have received a large amount of revenue
from oil and other resources, making the government "instantly"
very rich. He said Indonesia has a strong interest in improving
education in Papua and in making sure special autonomy succeeds.
Since 1969, when Papua was transferred from Dutch to Indonesian
rule, about 100,000 Papuans - the equivalent of a sixth of the
current population - have died in military operations in the poor,
but resource-rich, area.
Wirajuda said Indonesia should be judged by its efforts to
improve human rights, not by abuses in the past.
Also Monday, Clinton announced that the United States had
committed $10 million in higher education funding for Indonesia.
