Shane J. Barter – The highly anticipated 2014 Indonesian national elections are fast approaching. For years, the big question has been what happens after the sitting president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY), finishes his second and final term.

Banda Aceh – The government in Aceh has claimed that a social media movement aiming to discredit Shariah law in the province exists, though it has refused to provide any details on who may be carrying out the conspiracy.

Nadya Natahadibrata, Jakarta – A coalition of women's rights groups report that cases of violence against women have been on the rise in Aceh in the past two years.

Nurdin Hasan – A police officer was publicly caned in an Aceh district on Tuesday for violating Shariah law, making him the first law enforcer to receive such a punishment.

Darwin, the head of general crimes unit at the Sabang Attorney's Office, told the Jakarta Globe that Brig. Irwanuddin was lashed six times for gambling in the district of Aceh Besar.

Camelia Pasandaran – A women's rights group has criticized a move by North Aceh's district head to ban women in the area from dancing in public places.

Muhammad Thaib, the district chief, on Saturday said that he had banned all adult women from dancing when welcoming guests in North Aceh, adding that only children should perform the tradition.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Police in Indonesia's westernmost city have thwarted the caning of a police officer and two other people convicted by Aceh's morality police of gambling, highlighting the double standard in enforcing Shariah law in the province.

The Forestry Ministry has denied claims by several environmental groups that 1.2 million hectares of protected forest in Aceh will be cleared if the province's proposed spatial planning draft is approved.

Nadya Natahadibrata, Jakarta – More than a million people worldwide have joined online calls for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to block the Aceh administration's plan to open protected forests for commercial exploitation.

More than a million people across the globe have signed an online petition demanding the Indonesian government to cancel the plan to open the protected virgin rainforest in Aceh to commercial exploitation.

Jakarta – The Institute for the Free Flow of Information (ISAI) announced on Tuesday that Aceh is the least likely province to allow press freedom and the most dangerous for journalists in Indonesia's 34 provinces.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The Aceh Legislative Council (DPRA) is mulling a Shariah bylaw that would mandate tougher sentences for convicted rapists than those doled out under the Indonesian Criminal Code.

A dispute over a flag in Aceh is testing the limits of autonomy, provoking Indonesia's central government and could pave the way for separatist factions to emerge, the International Crisis Group said.

Ina Parlina, National – The two-week deadline has passed but the central government and the Aceh provincial administration are no closer to resolving the controversial plan to change the province's official flag, which resembles the flag of the now-defunct separatist group, the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

Camelia Pasandaran & Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Homosexual men and women living in Indonesia's strictly conservative Aceh province would be publicly lashed 100 times under a new bylaw backed by the provincial capital's deputy governor.

Index: ASA 21/011/2013

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The Banda Aceh Administrative Court on Friday ruled in favor of a palm oil company in its lawsuit against the Aceh governor's revocation of its permit to clear and operate on a 1,605-hectare land in Rawa Tripa, a lush forest and peatland region in the province's Nagan Raya district.

Ina Parlina, Jakarta – Constitutional Court chief Akil Mochtar said on Tuesday there was no need to fret about Aceh's official flag, which resembles the flag of the now-defunct separatist group, the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Dozens of legislative candidates vying for the 81 seats in the Aceh provincial legislature in the 2014 general election have flunked a Koran proficiency test – one of the requirements under a local bylaw for running for public office.

Yuliasri Perdani, Jakarta – The latest study from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Indonesia found that the local administration in Aceh is the worst performer when it comes to protecting the country's remaining forests.

Of the country's top 10 provinces with the largest forest area Aceh scored the lowest on the UNDP's forest government index.

Banda Aceh – As many as 1,231 legislative candidates from across Aceh will take a Koran recital test organized by the Aceh Independent Election Monitoring Committee (KIP) as part of a requirement for every person contesting the 2014 election.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Police in Aceh suspect a political motive is behind the murder of a local politician who was gunned down by unknown assailants on Friday morning.

Muhammad bin Zainal Abidin, 33, a member of the Aceh National Party (PNA), was shot twice in the back of the head after his Toyota Avanza MPV was reportedly hijacked.

Jakarta – An online petition against forest clearance in Aceh has the support of 20,000 netizens.

As of Friday, the petition at http://change.org/selamatkanAceh, had drawn 20,200 signatories both from Indonesia and abroad.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – All candidates contesting next year's legislative elections in Aceh will be required to take a Koran proficiency test, a member of the province's electoral body said on Tuesday.

Niniek Karmini, Jakarta, Indonesia – An international rights group urged Indonesian authorities on Thursday to seek justice for victims of a separatist conflict in Aceh province that ended with a peace agreement nearly eight years ago, warning that growing resentment could lead to future violence.

Margareth S. Aritonang, Jakarta – Claiming that none of alleged rights abuses during the 30-year-conflict between the Indonesian government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) have been resolved, a coalition of human rights watchdogs has called for the a tribunal to hear past cases of rights violations.

The Indonesian government has said it aims to approve within a month a plan that would free up vast swathes of protected virgin rainforest on Sumatra island for commercial exploitation.

Laura Dawson, Gabriel Kereh & Tito Summa Siahaan – The specter of a resurgence in violence in Aceh looms large unless past rights abuses are properly addressed, a human rights group said on Thursday, in a warning that suggests its economic recovery could be derailed following three decades of separatist insurgency and a devastating tsunami.

Victims and family members are still waiting for the Indonesian authorities to provide them with truth, justice and full reparation almost eight years after the end to the devastating Aceh conflict, Amnesty International said in a new report released today.

Michael Bachelard – A mining company has boasted of an Indonesian government decision to free up 1.2 million hectares of virgin forest in Aceh for commercial exploitation.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – The Aceh Legislative Council (DPRA) is accelerating the deliberation of a provincial qanun (bylaw) to establish the Commission on Truth and Reconciliation (KKR) in Aceh by holding hearings involving activists and institutions concerned with human rights issues.

Thirty-five women in Aceh's city of Lhokseumawe have been let off with a warning after the Shariah police caught them straddling a motorcycle and not wearing appropriate Islamic dress.

The Shariah police were conducting a raid on the main roads of Lhokseumawe on Friday, to monitor the administration's bylaw that prohibits female passengers from straddling motorcycles.

Imran MA, Lhokseumawe – Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) officers and Sharia police (Wilayatul Hisbah) began conducted raids on motorcycle riders on the main roads of Lhokseumawe city in Northern Aceh on April 12.

Nurdin Hasan – A plan to draft a bylaw on how Islamic men and women in Aceh's Bireuen District should dress as Muslims is a wasteful effort that nobody needs, activists say.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The Bireuen Legislative Council in Aceh are preparing a draft bylaw on how Islamic men and women in the district should dress as Muslims.

Ezra Sihite & Nurdin Hasan, Jakarta/Banda Aceh – Military chief of staff Adm. Agus Suhartono has urged the people of Aceh to refrain from flying the Free Aceh Movement flag for at least the next two weeks while the Home Affairs Ministry reviews the provincial bylaw allowing for a change in its flag and symbol.

Rizky Amelia – The current furor over a decision by authorities in Aceh to adopt the flag of a defunct separatist group as the provincial standard highlights regional dissatisfaction with Jakarta's stewardship of the country, analysts say.

Nurdin Hasan – A teacher at an Islamic boarding school in Aceh sustained serious injuries after being beaten by the parents of a student he disciplined.

Ina Parlina, Jakarta – The President is telling the people of Aceh to follow the law and to only fly the Indonesian flag – and not a flag inspired by a former separatist movement – for the next two weeks.

"It is clear that the Red-and-White should be displayed throughout the whole motherland. It is our flag," President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said on Friday.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – Convoys of people drove through the streets of Banda Aceh on Thursday, brandishing the flag of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), despite a request from Aceh's governor.

Banda Aceh – Thousands of demonstrators rallied in Indonesia's Aceh on Thursday in support of local leaders' bid to adopt a separatist flag as the staunchly Islamic province's official emblem.

Hotli Simanjuntak, Banda Aceh – The central government has given the Aceh provincial administration 15 days to clarify Qanun (Bylaw) No. 3/2013 on the Aceh provincial flag and coat of arms by sending a letter to Aceh's governor and the Aceh Legislative Council (DPRA).

Ezra Sihite, Nurdin Hasan & Arientha Primanita – President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has sent a government minister to Aceh to dissuade local officials from adopting a separatist symbol as the once-restive province's official flag.

Police in Aceh have arrested two men for allegedly raping and strangling a six-year-old girl to death.

Adj. Comr. Erlin Tangjaya, the head of the Aceh Police's detectives unit, told Indonesian news portal Kompas.com that two men, aged 20 and 19, were arrested after the girl's family reported her missing last week.

The head of the Lhokseumawe Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) and Shariah Police in Aceh has tested positive for marijuana use after slamming his car into a tree and a house on Sunday night, police said.

Environmental activists have condemned the Aceh administration following confirmation that it planned to reverse a logging ban imposed by the previous administration and clear up to 1.2 million hectares of protected forest across the province.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Activists in Aceh on Wednesday protested a local Islamic council's recent edict accusing a cleric in South Aceh district of blasphemous teachings.

Jakarta – Environmental activists have called on the government to review the draft spatial planning bylaw proposed by the Aceh administration, which they say is putting the province's protected forests at risk.

Ina Parlina, Jakarta – The Judicial Commission (KY) said on Wednesday that it would launch a probe into a report that a judge, who was dismissed from his position a year ago, continues to hear cases in Nangroe Aceh Darussalam.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – The Aceh government has removed a provision for the stoning to death of adulterers from its draft of the Qanun Jinayat, a set of bylaws that replaces elements of the Criminal Code with Shariah provisions for Muslims, which was endorsed by the Aceh Legislative Council in 2009.

Nurdin Hasan, Banda Aceh – Authorities in Banda Aceh rounded up dozens of people over the weekend, mostly women, for allegedly violating the province's ultraconservative Islamic bylaws on indecent conduct.