Kathy Marks, Banda Aceh – "Excuse me," says Iskandar, as his mobile phone beeps for the umpteenth time in the past half hour. It's another anonymous tip-off, alerting him to a young couple who have been seen spending time together alone.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – Participants were met with applause, but also taunts when they stepped on the catwalk during a Miss Transvestite Aceh pageant on Saturday evening.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – In their best Acehese costumes, kitsch jewelry and towering hair buns, 40 transsexuals sashayed down a stage on Saturday to loud club music, disco lights and rapturous applause as they competed in the Miss Transsexual Aceh 2010.

Adi Warsidi, Jakarta – Thousands of female protesters took to the streets in Aceh Province on Monday (8/2) to demand the release of remaining political prisoners in government prisons, criticising the government for failing to complete one of the deals in the the 2005 peace accord with with the Free Aceh Movement.

Nurdin Hasan – Aceh still remembers Tjut Nya Dien, one in a long tradition of heroes who tirelessly fought against the Dutch. But since independence, Acehnese fighters have been more interested in turning their arms against the central government than on any outside force.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Two human rights activists said on Sunday that the implementation of Shariah law in Aceh was unfair and discriminatory, as it only applied to the common people, while government officials and wealthy people were never sentenced to public lashings.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Women's tight trousers and men's short pants have become the focus of Aceh's Shariah Police, who have intensified their patrols to get the shameful articles of clothing off the streets.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – A signboard on Jl. Mister Muhammad Hasan, the main access to provincial capital Banda Aceh, reads: "Welcome to Banda Aceh, Indonesia's Islamic tourism destination." As a place blessed with natural beauty, tourism is one of our main assets to improve our economy," said Banda Aceh vice Mayor Illiza Saadudin.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Students in the West Aceh capital of Meulaboh have ended a five-day hunger strike to demand housing for survivors of the 2004 tsunami after several of the strikers grew dangerously weak.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – Growing up, Faisal was not really aware that he had a different sexual orientation from his friends, but as an adult he is very conscious of his sexuality and the discrimination he suffers as a result.

Faisal lives in Aceh, the only province in Indonesia that has Islamic sharia law.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – A group of sharia police personnel unusually just sit in the back of a pick-up patrol vehicle while making the rounds in downtown Banda Aceh, Aceh province, on Monday.

No raid is conducted that day at beauty salons or other public places considered prone to sharia (Islamic law) violations. No stern actions are taken or arrests made that day.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Zulkifli Zainon, the mayor of Langsa city in Aceh, officially dismissed the chief of the local Shariah Police, Syahril, on Wednesday over allegations that three of his officers gang-raped a 20-year-old university student.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Aceh's deputy governor said on Tuesday that there was no need to disband the province's Wilayatul Hisbah, or Shariah Police, because there was no legal obligation to do so.

Karima Anjani and John M. Glionna, Tokyo and Jakarta – Three members of a civilian patrol that enforces Islam's strict Sharia law in Indonesia's Aceh province have been accused of gang-raping a 20-year-old university student, authorities there said.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – - Shariah Police officers who are suspects in Friday's alleged gang rape of a 20-year-old university student may find some respite from knowing they will be charged under the Criminal Code and not the province's Islamic law.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – A serious blow to the credibility and morality of sharia police in Aceh province, has occurred after several members were detained for an alleged gang rape in Langsa regency.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Having gang-raped and tortured a female student at the Langsa Shariah Police station in Aceh, the three officers responsible have forever blackened the name of the religious police as upholders of Islamic law, Aceh's Shariah Police deputy commander said on Wednesday.

Stephen Fitzpatrick, Jakarta – Here's a provocative thought: if it weren't for the 2004 tsunami, Western aid workers in Banda Aceh city would not be the target of politically motivated drive-by shootings, and women in West Aceh regency would be free to wear trousers.

Hundreds of tsunami refugees in Aceh province held a rally in front of West Aceh's Regional Representative Council Building on Monday to demand homes that they said the government had promised them.

A female demonstrator named Suriati collapsed during the rally and had to be rushed to the hospital. Suriati was six months pregnant and in a weak condition.

Jerome Rivet, Banda Aceh – She wears a helmet and drives her scooter slowly through the capital of Indonesia's Aceh province, but Yuli is still stopped by the sharia police. Her crime: wearing tight jeans and a blouse deemed "un-Islamic".

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Today, the people of Aceh commemorate the most tragic day in our history with prayers, memories and visits to the mass graves that hold the unidentified remains of thousands of our loved ones, neighbors and friends.

On Boxing Day 2004, a tsunami killed more than 220,000 people. Five years on, Tim Hume returns to Indonesia and witnesses a remarkable recovery.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Aceh's Religious Affairs Office has moved to distance itself from its controversial decision to prevent the barongsai, or Chinese lion dance, from being performed during commemorations for the 2004 tsunami by the Chinese Buddhist community in Banda Aceh last Sunday.

Nurdin Hasan, Anita Rachman & Putri Prameshwari, Banda Aceh – Religious officials in Aceh have sparked yet another controversy, this time banning the barongsai, or traditional Chinese lion dance, from a cultural performance as part of commemorations leading up to the fifth anniversary of the 2004 tsunami that devastated the province.

Lampuk (Indonesia) – Ikra Alfila has rediscovered the joy of play, but the little 10-year-old still has nightmares about giant waves five years after the tsunami that killed everyone in her family except her father.

Teuku Dani Ramadhan, Zahara Sulaiman & Ade Mardiyati – In Pasar Rakyat, a market in Meulaboh in Indonesia's West Aceh, a young woman busily browses through a rack of skirts.

She is wearing a loose, long skirt, a tight, long-sleeved T-shirt and a jilbab that comes up to her chest. She analyzes the material of the skirts, touching them to feel the texture.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Activists in Aceh on Friday criticized the lack of civil involvement in the autonomous region when they met with Martti Ahtisaari, the diplomat who brokered the 2005 peace agreement between the Free Aceh Movement and the central government.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Former rebels of the Free Aceh Movement celebrated the 33rd anniversary of the founding of their now-disbanded organization by holding mass prayers and providing meals for orphans of the 30-year civil conflict.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – Foreign citizens have yet again become the target of terror attacks in Aceh, this time against two American citizens staying in a house at the Syiah Kuala University lecturer's housing complex in Banda Aceh.

The shooting attack caused damage to several windows, but no casualties were reported.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Aceh's controversial Qanun Jinayat code, which allows stoning to death for adulterers, would be difficult to implement because it was open to interpretation, Indonesian law enforcers concluded after a two-day workshop here over the weekend.

The equivalent of about 10,000 football fields of forest have been lost each year for the past five years in Aceh's Leuser ecosystem due to illegal logging and the clearing of land for palm plantations and new roads.

Bachtiar Effendy, Jakarta – It seems almost natural that the Aceh legislature has passed a bill on adultery based on Islamic sharia – which derives from the Koran and Sunnah (traditions of Prophet Muhammad). According to the Koran, adultery is punishable by 100 strokes of the cane. A married person committing adultery has to be stoned to death.

Banda Aceh – Officials say a German working for the Red Cross has been shot by men on a motorcycle in Indonesia's Aceh province.

Police say Erhard Bauer, 50, was shot Thursday in the arm and stomach. The motive is unknown. Red Cross spokeswoman Svenja Koch says Bauer was flown to Singapore for treatment. She could not say if the injuries were life threatening.

Camelia Pasandaran – Fourteen civil society groups on Thursday condemned Aceh's stoning bylaw, the Qanun Jinayat code, saying that most Acehnese were not in favor of it but that critics were being silenced by heavy-handed religious police.

Ref: TG ASA 21/2009/44. AI Index: ASA 21/021/2009

Gamawan Fauzi
Home Affairs Minister
Jl. Medan Merdeka Utara No. 7.
Jakarta Pusat
Indonesia

4 November 2009

Dear Minister,

RE: The Islamic Criminal Code in Aceh

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – The sharia regulation prohibiting women from wearing pants in West Aceh regency drew strong condemnation from public circles in Aceh province.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The local bylaw calling for adulterers to be stoned to death cannot be implemented because lawmakers who passed the regulation did not act with the blessings of the governor, the acting chair of the Aceh Provincial Legislature said on Friday.

Nurdin Hasan, Candra Malik & Antara, Banda Aceh – Human rights activists protested on Thursday over a district-wide ban on women wearing tight pants scheduled to take effect in West Aceh in January, saying it was a violation of women's rights.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Wild animal attacks in Aceh, particularly by elephants and Sumatran tigers, are highlighting the worsening conflict between wildlife and humans owing to the increasing destruction of natural habitat caused by illegal logging.

Jakarta – Muslim women would be banned from wearing tight pants in a devoutly Islamic district of Indonesia's Aceh province under proposed regulations to take effect Jan. 1, an official said Wednesday.

Hotli Simanjuntak and Jon Afrizal, Banda Aceh, Jambi – Deforestation in Aceh has continued to worsen despite the signing of a logging moratorium that prohibits anyone from felling forest trees, a non-governmental organization said.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – The newly inaugurated members of the Aceh Legislative Council are set to revise the sharia bylaw passed by former legislators that stipulate, among others, stoning to death for adulterers.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Responding to a public outcry over the bylaw that mandates stoning to death for adulterers, Aceh Legislative Council members have agreed to review the Islamic criminal code endorsed by previous councilors in September, a provincial lawmaker said on Tuesday.

Jakarta – NGOs will request a judicial review of the newly endorsed bylaw in Aceh that condemns adulterers to be stoned to death.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – Hundreds of relatives of Acehnese people who went missing during the conflict, which lasted from 1976 to 2005, have strongly urged the provincial government to establish a special court to settle unresolved human rights abuses and provide them with compensation.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The Aceh government said on Friday that it would not let recently crowned Putri Indonesia Qori Sandioriva represent the province as she had failed to comply with the conditions set for her to be allowed to enter the competition.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The aging former leader of the disbanded Free Aceh Movement is expected to arrive in the province on Saturday for the second time since he fled the country in 1977.

A new law mandating death by stoning for adulterers in Indonesia's deeply Islamic Aceh province advocates "torture" and should be overturned, US-based group Human Rights Watch said Monday.

"Stoning and flogging constitute torture in any circumstances," Human Rights Watch Asia head Elaine Pearson said in a statement.

Nurdin Hassan, Banda Aceh – In the latest religious dispute out of Aceh, a prominent group of Islamic clerics has denounced newly crowned Putri Indonesia Qori Sandioriva for "bringing shame" to the province by abandoning its conservative Muslim values on her way to winning the title.

Stoning and flogging constitute torture in any circumstances. Imposing these draconian punishments on private, consensual conduct means the government can dictate people's intimate lives – Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch