 he killing by Indonesian troops last Tuesday of Abdullah Syafii, commander of the 25-year-old separatist Free Acheh Movement (GAM) guerrilla army, attracted international attention. But it is ordinary Achenese like Helmi who are the more common victims of this long-running conflict—one which some observers here say could worsen after Syafii's death.
About a week before Syafii died, Helmi said he cowered in a nearby building while a team of Indonesian soldiers and paramilitary police fired their guns in the air and arrested five students and three other people in a Banda Acheh neighborhood.
"There was no reason to arrest the five but they accused the others of being GAM," said Helmi, who alleged he saw the suspects being beaten. The Acheh non-government organization Coalition for Human Rights has documented 33 murders of civilians across Acheh in the first 24 days of this year. More than 1,700 died last year.
Faisal Hadi, who is in charge of collecting the Coalition's grim data, said the numbers will likely increase after Syafii's death.
"Because firstly, possibly GAM wants to make revenge and secondly, the TNI (Indonesia's armed forces) will see this as a good chance to eradicate the rest of GAM," he said.
Syafii died in a TNI attack just a few days after Acheh Governor Abdullah Puteh announced he would send a letter inviting the GAM commander for peace talks. GAM alleges the envelope contained a microchip that allowed security
forces to track him.
Puteh repeated his denials of the claim in an interview Saturday with AFP. He also refuted suggestions that the military might have tried to sabotage a peace effort.
"No, no, no. I know, in fact, that when GAM is ready to hold a dialogue the military will also like to talk. There's no problem," Puteh said, sitting in front of a large aquarium at his residence.
He said it is difficult to predict what will happen after the death of Syafii but both he and the central government remain interested in advancing the dialogue. Hadi was pessimistic, saying the room for talking has now become very small.
The spokesman for the Indonesian security forces said 12,000 police officers and roughly 15,000 troops on duty in Acheh are prepared for any GAM retaliation that may follow the killing of their commander, who was widely respected here for his simple lifestyle.
But Superintendent Agus Dwiyanto said the security forces are not trying to eliminate GAM. They are instead trying to take a "persuasive" approach toward their opponent, he said.
"Why do they attack so many military and police posts? Because we are not offensive," Dwiyanto said, adding that over the last six months the security forces have brought increased stability to Banda Acheh.
"When I first came here you still heard bombs. In the morning or at night there was always shooting," he said. Soldiers are concentrated in rural Acheh but in the capital, apart from occasional rifle-toting policemen or soldiers riding two abreast on motorcycles, there is little visible presence of the security forces which were much more noticeable in the city one year ago.
Dwiyanto's words do nothing to ease the fear and discontent of someone like Helmi, who says the Achenese people would accept Indonesians and even their security forces if they stopped mistreating people.
"Achenese people will accept anyone, if they are decent," he said. "But if someone isn't honest—even our own brothers—we don't like it."
© 2002 Agence France-Presse. All rights reserved.
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