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| Wednesday, 23 February 2005 |
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Aceh rebels say ready to abandon independence goal HELSINKI, Tuesday (Reuters) Aceh rebels are willing to drop their 30-year demand for independence in peace talks with Indonesia in Helsinki, a spokesman said on Tuesday. "The conflict cannot be solved like that and we have to come to terms with that," Free Aceh Movement (GAM) spokesman Bakhtiar Abdullah said when asked if the goal of full independence had been abandoned in the interest of achieving greater autonomy. "That is the main thing on the table," he told Reuters, referring to self government. "Of course in the negotiations we go with the tangible things that are on the table." GAM and Indonesian officials are in their second round of peace talks in three weeks in Helsinki, seeking an end to the three-decade conflict that has cost more than 12,000 lives. One of the main sticking points in the talks has been the form of autonomy Jakarta is ready to offer the Acehnese, who see the "special autonomy" on offer as the status quo and prefer the term "self government", GAM adviser Damien Kingsbury said. In a breakthrough, Kingsbury said the Indonesians had agreed to take the "self government" idea back to Jakarta for approval or discussion. He said the rest of the talks would now focus on the political building blocks for a future Aceh. "This was a very significant impediment and, now it appears to have been at least in part resolved, the substantive issues are now starting to move," Kingsbury said. An Indonesian spokesman declined to comment on the news. |
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