'Soldiers and officials were accused of gross human rights violations during the campaign that left more than 3,000 people killed and only exacerbated anti-Indonesian feeling.'

he Jakarta Post said the call dominated the closed-door meeting in the provincial capital Banda Acheh on Saturday.

"The more troops coming to Acheh, the more unarmed civilians will be killed. Therefore the 2001 presidential decree number 4 should be revoked," sources quoted Abdul Gani Nurdin, the leader of the Yadesa non-governmental organisation, as having said.

A decree issued by then-president Abdurrahman Wahid in April called for a comprehensive solution to the Acheh problem. It was used to launch a military operation in Acheh where separatists of the Free Acheh Movement (GAM) have been waging a revolt since 1976,

Nurdin said past experience had shown that violence could not resolve the problem.

The Suharto government in 1989 launched a military campaign which lasted nine years but failed to stamp out the rebellion.

Soldiers and officials were accused of gross human rights violations during the campaign that left more than 3,000 people killed and only exacerbated anti-Indonesian feeling.

At the same meeting two Muslim leaders called on Megawati to continue dialogue with the GAM and order a ceasefire at once, the sources said.

"If my suggestion is accepted, I am convinced that peace will return to Acheh," Tengku Daud Zamzami, vice chairman of the provincial chapter of the Indonesian Council of Muslim Scholars, was quoted as saying.

Zamzami reportedly said Achenese Muslim scholars are prepared to act as mediators in a dialogue.

He said the government could start by facilitating a meeting between the Muslim scholars and the leader of the GAM, Hasan Tiro, currently living in Sweden.

Megawati, during her one-day visit on Saturday, met an estimated 100 community representatives. She is hoping to persuade Acheh's four million people to accept an offer of enhanced autonomy rather than independence, an option she has ruled out.

Police on Monday accused GAM of abducting five civic leaders as they returned home from meeting Megawati.

The five were kidnapped by some 20 rebels in the Krueng Sabee area of West Acheh on Saturday and taken to a remote mountainous area, Acheh police spokesman Sad Harunantyo told AFP.

Local GAM spokesman Abu Tausi denied the five had been kidnapped, saying they had spent a night with him for a reunion.

He said one of the five was his religious teacher whom he had not met in two years and that all five had returned home to South Acheh on Sunday.

Harunantyo said police had not yet received information on the return of the five.

Tausi also said rebels on Sunday killed four soldiers and wounded three others in three different gunfights. The incidents were denied by Harunantyo.

The violence in Acheh has claimed some 1,500 lives this year alone.

The article is distributed by Tapol in London