TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
RMS, an overview
Gotcha: A police officer (left) helps an RMS arrestee of a boat in Amboru village, Central Maluku regency
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
Gotcha: A police officer (left) helps an RMS arrestee of a boat in Amboru village, Central Maluku regency. JP/M. Aziz Tunny
The activities of the South Maluku Republic (RMS) separatist movement have been on and off, bringing about occasional political and security upheavals in Maluku. After being crushed by the Indonesian military in November 1950, RMS followers still expressed their desire for freedom by flying their flag.
The South Maluku Republic was proclaimed on April 25, 1950. After seven decades, this movement is still striving to set up the RMS state by separating Maluku from the Republic of Indonesia.
Although no military forces are involved, this group was found to have had close links with the Ambon conflict which broke out in January 1999.
Before the Ambon conflict, the authorities had detected RMS underground activity.
In 1989, the Pattimura military command uncovered an RMS organizational network in Ambon and its plan to train armed troops on Seram Island.
When Maluku turmoil prevailed between 1999-2004, RMS attempted to mobilize support. Several RMS activists were caught and tried on charges of treason.
RMS networks are in Maluku and Holland. The RMS movement has continued to mark periodical events in Maluku/Indonesia as well as overseas. Almost annually, adherents of RMS in Maluku and Holland fly their flags to celebrate the April 25 RMS proclamation day.
Apart from the seemingly never waning existence of this group, the problem of RMS has for a long time become a sensitive subject and a contentious issue between Indonesia and the Netherlands.
— JP/M. Azis Tunny
