Ridwan Max Sijabat, Jakarta – Political tensions were expected to calm gradually in the once-restive Aceh after parties agreed to accept nominations of independent candidates on the condition that the gubernatorial election would be rescheduled.

Index: ASA 21/021/2011

Amnesty International welcomed the decision by a US Court of Appeals that US-based Exxon Mobil can face claims relating to extrajudicial killings, torture, and prolonged arbitrary detention by Indonesian soldiers in Indonesia's Aceh province under the US Alien Tort Statute (ATS).

Stephen Schaber – Aceh will hold its second post-conflict election in November and, according to the International Crisis Group, it will be bitterly contested by two former Free Aceh Movement (GAM) allies.

Jakarta/Brussels – Five years after the first post-conflict elections in Aceh brought former guerrillas of the Free Aceh Movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, GAM) to power, local elections scheduled for November 2011 are turning into a bitter intra-GAM battle.

Over 100 demonstrators protesting the issuance of mining permits vandalized the gate of the Aceh governor's office on Monday after they were banned from staging a rally inside the building's compound.

The protestors, mostly members of environmental organizations, rallied to urge the governor to revoke 120 mining permits and to close mining areas in the province.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Aceh has decided to hold its provincial, district and mayoral elections on Nov. 14, but the absence of supervisory bodies at each level is raising concerns of possible campaign and polling irregularities.

An Indonesian human rights group on Friday condemned the use of caning in staunchly Islamic Aceh province, saying the punishment violated the country's constitution.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Eighteen men and one woman were caned in the eastern Aceh town of Langsa on Thursday, less than a week after Amnesty International called for an end to the practice.

The caning took place in the town's Merdeka Park and was watched by more than a thousand onlookers.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – City officials said on Thursday that they would stick to their threat to name and shame members of a banned sect who had not yet repented before the deadline of Wednesday.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – M. is a member of the Wilayatul Hisbah, Aceh's Shariah Police, and he is proud of it. But the athletically built 33-year-old is no ordinary officer.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Acehnese clerics have criticized Amnesty International's call for the Indonesian government to repeal a bylaw that allowed caning, arguing that the practice did not violate any regulation in the world.

Jakarta – Amnesty International urged Indonesia to repeal laws in Aceh that allow the use of caning as a punishment as it violates international human rights law, just after Indonesia was re-elected into the UN Human Rights Council.

The Indonesian government must end the use of caning as a form of punishment and repeal the laws that allow it in Aceh province, Amnesty International said today after at least 21 people were publicly caned since 12 May.

Nurdin Hasan – Fourteen people convicted of violating Aceh's strict Islamic code on gambling were publicly caned in Langsa, East Aceh, a prosecutor said on Friday.

Irvon, who heads the general crimes division at the Langsa Prosecutors Office, said each of the 14 offenders received six lashes within the grounds of the Darul Falah Mosque on Thursday.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Organizers of a beauty pageant in Aceh defied opposition from a conservative Islamic group by staging the event on Friday evening.

Organizing committee member Poppy Amalia said claims that the Miss Aceh Fair 2011 pageant went against Islamic values were nonsense.

Islamic students organization Rabithah Thaliban Aceh (RTA) has opposed plans to hold a Miss Aceh pageant as part of the 2011 Aceh Fair at Blang Padang in Banda Aceh.

According to the fair's official Web site, the 2011 Aceh Fair will be held from May 8 to 15, with the Miss Aceh pageant held on Friday.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The Aceh Jaya district administration has banned four nongovernmental organizations from conducting relief work after the groups were accused of carrying out missionary and conversion activities.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh - Officials have lambasted an Australian carbon broker for selling the marketing rights for carbon credits created through a forest conservation project to a Canadian mining firm.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Over a hundred members of the recently banned Millata Abraham Muslim sect on Friday underwent a mass conversion to mainstream faith at the Baiturrahman Raya Mosque in Banda Aceh.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Human rights activists on Tuesday criticized Aceh's provincial administration for failing to prevent vigilantes from punishing alleged violators of Shariah law in a variety of ways – from sexually harassing people to beating them up.

Nurdin Hasan, Aceh Besar – Two couples in staunchly Muslim Aceh were caned in public on Friday for separate acts of indecency.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Unknown assailants threw a live grenade at the home of an Aceh Party leader early Friday, sparking fears about the resurgence of politically motivated terrorism in the province.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Thousands of Muslim teachers and students on Thursday thronged the streets of Banda Aceh, demanding that the governor clamp down on "deviant" religious sects.

The protesters, waving placards bearing condemnations of groups that "deviated from the true teachings of Islam," marched toward Aceh Governor Irwandi Yusuf's office.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – An activist in Aceh has attacked the provincial administration for endorsing a mining plan that he insists will severely damage the environment and cause more conflict.

Heavy flooding in eight subdistricts of West Aceh has forced the evacuation of thousands of people, an official said.

"Volunteers are still evacuating the flood victims. The flooding was triggered by heavy rain, which started last week, causing rivers in West Aceh to overflow," said Ahmad Dadek from the local Disaster Management Office (BPBD).

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Decades of armed conflict in Aceh may be officially over, but scars remain from that tumultuous time that, as people like Reza Idri insist, should never be forgotten.

Reza, the director of the newly inaugurated Museum of Aceh Human Rights, believes the past holds valuable lessons no matter how painful they are.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – A squad of Aceh's "fashion police" was berated and attacked on Wednesday by a group of men angry over the officers' attempt to escort what they deemed to be an immodestly-dressed woman to their offices for counseling.

Jakarta – Women should have greater opportunities in decision-making processes to ensure the effectiveness of policy programs designed to help the poor – especially women and children – activists say.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Pidie, Aceh – Uncontrolled illegal logging has been blamed for a flash flood in Tangse district, Pidie regency, Aceh, on Thursday evening. The flood waters killed at least 12 people and displaced hundreds of families.

Nurdin Hasan & Antara, Pidie, Aceh – At least 11 people were killed and more than 100 homes destroyed in a flash flood that struck Pidie district in Aceh on Thursday night.

The flood, caused by heavy rains that forced rivers to burst their banks, sent residents of eight villages in Tangse subdistrict fleeing for higher ground.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Rizal Adi Syaputra says he is a proud punk, but still prefers to hide his dyed red hair under a cap.

The 20-year-old is a member of one of the Aceh capital's five punk communities that have become the latest target of the province's Wilayatul Hisbah, or Shariah Police, and Public Order Agency (Satpol PP).

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – The Network for Civil Society Concerned with Sharia (JMSPS) in Aceh has criticized clerics and asked them not to overly interfere in enforcing the Muslim dress code, especially for Muslim women in the province.

Nurdin Hasan – A group of 18 civil society organizations in Aceh has lashed out at local clerics' interpretation of Shariah, which it says is unduly focused on women's clothing.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – A military prosecutor has lowered his demand for punishment from five years to less than 10 months in jail for a former intelligence officer who attacked a journalist and threatened to kill him and his family in Aceh in May.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Aceh is fast becoming a key destination for firearms smuggled into and around the country, a human rights activist said on Tuesday.

Zulfikar Muhammad, from the Aceh Human Rights Coalition, said the province's role in the illegal gun trade over the past year has become more apparent following a surge in armed crimes there last year.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – An antigraft watchdog has called for the acquittal of two men facing defamation charges in Central Aceh, saying they were just doing their jobs when they reported corruption allegations possibly involving a district head.

People in Aceh province are advised against festive New Year's Eve celebrations, including the use of fireworks and blowing on trumpets because it is against Sharia law.

"It must be obeyed by the people," Said Yulizal, the head of Aceh's Sharia office told news portal Okezone.com.

Langsa, Aceh – Six years after the Indian Ocean tsunami swept more than 200,000 people to their death, Titik Yuniarti still clings to hope at least one of her children is alive.

Like other desperate mothers, she has placed ads begging for information in newspapers in western Indonesia and hung fliers alongside others fluttering from lampposts.

The rebuilding of Aceh from the enormous destruction of the 2004 tsunami has been impressive, but the province continues to lag behind the rest of the nation in terms of poverty, life expectancy and other quality of life indicators, the UN said in its first Aceh Human Development Report released today.

Christen Broecker – When President Obama went to Indonesia last month, he lauded its embrace of democracy in a speech at the University of Indonesia but made clear that equality was essential to its success.

Apriadi Gunawan, Medan – Refugees from the Aceh conflict era admitted to having been intimidated by "anti-relocation" figures, saying that threats had deterred them from moving from a protected forest in North Sumatra to a new location in South Sumatra.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – If the Aceh legislature has its way, the province will soon have a supreme leader with the authority to dismiss the governor and disband the legislature.

Nurdin Hasan, Jantho, Indonesia – Two people received eight lashes each in Islamic Shariah law-controlled Aceh on Friday after being found engaging in an extramarital kiss.

A crowd of hundreds watched as Anis Saputra, 24, and Kiki Hanafilia, 17, were given eight lashes each at a mosque in Jantho, some 60 kilometers southeast of provincial capital Banda Aceh.

Nurdin Hasan & Nivell Rayda, Banda Aceh & Jakarta – Aceh's deputy governor and Shariah Police chief have dismissed a critical report on the province from an international human rights group, calling it exaggerated and based on factual errors.

"God will punish us by sending another great earthquake and tsunami if we don't uphold and enforce sharia [Islamic law] in this land," says a resident of Banda Aceh.

These two laws deny people's right to make their own decisions about who they meet and what they wear. The laws, and their selective enforcement, are an invitation to abuse. – Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch

Jakarta – Two local Shariah laws in Indonesia's Aceh province violate rights and are often enforced abusively by public officials and even private individuals, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Islamic boarding schools, called dayah in Aceh, are not just for the pious.

According to Hanisah, a 42-year-old Acehnese teacher, dayah are meant to shelter the downtrodden. And she has no qualms about proving shelter to anybody, even if it means risking her own life – as she did two years ago.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Hundreds of angry villagers in Manggi, West Aceh, on Saturday raided a subdistrict police station they believed was being used as a brothel and attacked a naked couple found inside, officials said on Sunday.

Nurdin Hasan & Markus Junianto Sihaloho, Banda Aceh & Jakarta – Seventy-eight civil society groups in Aceh have denounced a proposal to confer national hero status on former President Suharto, who they say bears most responsibility for a spate of human rights abuses in the province.