BACKGROUND TO THE CONFLICTThe confl

BACKGROUND TO THE CONFLICT

The conflict in Aceh has worsened dramatically since the fall of President Soeharto in 1998. While GAM has been in existence since 1976, it is only in the last two years that it has developed a significant popular base, a steady source of arms, and a relatively well-organized command structure. By July 2001, it exercised control over much of Aceh, with a particularly strong presence in six of the most populous, and wealthiest, districts.
When GAM was formed in 1976, its architects stressed the plundering of Aceh's wealth and resources by "Javanese-Indonesian" colonialists in the name of development and the need to recapture Aceh's past glory.10Economic grievances were and continue to be important, but the more immediate spur to the independence movement has been the failure of the post-Soeharto governments to address human rights abuses of the past, particularly those committed between 1990 and 1998.
The "DOM" Period
In 1989, over one hundred Libyan-trained GAM guerrillas returned to Aceh with rudimentary military training to try and give the then moribund rebellion a new lease on life. After they mounted a series of attacks on military and police posts, culminating in one raid on a police post in May 1990 that netted ammunition and dozens of automatic weapons, the Soeharto government declared Aceh an area of military operations (daerah operasi militeror DOM) and mounted one of the heaviest counterinsurgency campaigns seen since the 1960s.
Well over one thousand Acehnese civilians were killed in the first three years of operations, the worst phase of DOM. The most conservative accounting of victims, prepared by the provincial government in late 1998, documented 871 people killed outright by the army, and 387 missing who later turned up dead. More than 500 others were listed as "disappeared" and never found.11Most estimates by NGOs were at least twice as high. In addition, tens of thousands of Acehnese were imprisoned and tortured in military camps, and rape was reportedly widespread, with 102 cases documented by the local government team. So many people were affected that, today, virtually every Acehnese in the hardest-hit areas can cite a family member who was the direct target of a human rights violation - and who had no link to GAM at the time. Abuses continued through the end of DOM in August 1998, although at a lower level of intensity than in the 1990-93 period.
The resignation of Soeharto created expectations across Aceh that, at last, the truth would come out, justice would be done, and victims would be compensated. From late May 1998 onward, it was as though the lid had been suddenly blown off a pressure cooker of information. Every news broadcast on Indonesian television seemed to carry new revelations of abuses in Aceh, from testimonies of rape victims to discoveries of mass graves. New fact-finding missions were conducted, victim solidarity organizations formed, forensic training conducted. With newfound freedom of expression, assembly, and association, many more people were mobilized, not by GAM, but by student and NGO organizations, to demand justice for their relatives and establish links with each other.
In the middle of the onslaught of new information, the Habibie government acknowledged that Aceh's DOM status had never been lifted, and promised to do so forthwith. On August 7, 1998, General Wiranto, commander of Indonesia's armed forces, formally apologized to the people of Aceh for what they had endured at the military's hands. If, at this point, the Indonesian government had moved to investigate and prosecute officers for their role in the executions, "disappearances", rapes, and torture, it could have made a decisive break with the past and in all likelihood earned a measure of popular goodwill. Not only was nothing done, but key figures in the DOM hierarchy continued to occupy positions of influence throughout Indonesia.
Not long after Wiranto's apology, DOM status was formall