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.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsPrabowo to settle dispute over islands between Aceh, North Sumatra
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!
A number of elected regional heads from Aceh province gather at the National Monument (Monas) in Jakarta on February 20 shorty before their inauguration ceremony. (Antara Foto/Bayu Pratama S)
P
resident Prabowo Subianto will step in and handle the dispute surrounding four islands between Aceh and North Sumatra provinces, following tensions over the Home Ministry’s recent decision on the ownership of the islands.
House of Representatives Deputy Speaker Sufmi Dasco Ahmad revealed Prabowo’s plan to take care of the conflict after he talked to the President at an undisclosed time, when dispute about the islands started to grow.
“The result of the House’s communication with the President is that he is taking over the issue of the islands’ boundaries which have [marked] the dynamic between Aceh and North Sumatra provinces,” Dasco said on Saturday, as quoted by Antara.
Dasco, a politician from Prabowo’s Gerindra Party, said that the President was expected to make a decision on the issue next week. He did not elaborate further.
The conflict between Aceh and North Sumatra came after the Home Ministry issued a decree on Apr. 25 declaring four uninhabited islands along the border between the two provinces to be part of North Sumatra. They are Lipan Island, Panjang Island, Mangkir Besar Island and Mangkir Kecil Island.
The decree has since sparked backlash in Aceh and stirred up old tensions between the two provinces regarding their maritime boundaries and ownership of the islands that go back to as early as 2007.
The Home Ministry had issued at least three other decrees in 2017, 2021 and 2022, all declaring the islands as part of North Sumatra. The Aceh administration challenged all the decrees each time.
