Jacqueline Koch, Banda Aceh – Demur and modestly veiled in scarves, young women circulate through Aceh's coffee shops, food stalls and open markets.

Youth and gender shield them from suspicion as they listen to snatches of conversation and note who meets whom. Most are in their early 20s and not yet married, but they are known as the inong bale, or widows.

They are trained in military operations, to fire weapons and gather intelligence; they are the reserve force and the eyes and ears of GAM, the Free Aceh Movement which launched its struggle to gain independence from Indonesia in 1976.

After 24 years of conflict, women in this far north-western province of Indonesia are increasingly responding to the violence that surrounds them. Emerging from traditional Muslim roles, they have become leading activists, politicians, human rights defenders and rebel fighters.

Cut Nur Asyikin is known as the Lion of Aceh, and is the province's First Lady. A mother of five and a devout Muslim, she is an indefatigable soldier fighting to stop military aggression against civilians. Her role as political activist is imbued with her personal commitment to her people.

Travelling the circuit of refugee camps, she distributes food, supplies and moral support. At the hospital, she is a regular, visiting wounded civilians, digging into her purse for money to help the family pay medical bills.

Since president Soeharto was ousted in 1998 and after broken promises of reform, Acehnese demands for a referendum on independence have grown more insistent. The political elite in Jakarta, accustomed to reaping the profits from Aceh's substantial natural gas and timber resources, has resisted, and the violence has flared again.

A recent "humanitarian pause" in the fighting appears to have broken down completely after the death of 51 people en route to a pro-independence rally last month.

In the mist-shrouded hills beyond the capital, Banda Aceh, 250 women attend a lecture on international human rights laws in a makeshift meeting hall. It is the nucleus of an extensive separatist military camp, carved out of the tropical forest.

The inong bale enlist for a month-long induction in military operations and intelligence gathering. They also learn pro-independence ideology, international human rights laws and further their Islamic education. "Then we return to our villages, or start our university studies, but if our people need us we are ready to defend them," one inong bale initiate says.

Indonesia has repeatedly tried to wipeout GAM separatists using military repression. In 1988 Soeharto classified Aceh as a special military operations region, disguising a long-running and brutal military crackdown. Conservative estimates put the civilian death toll at 5,500.

Thousands were wounded, imprisoned or disappeared. Investigations by Indonesia's Human Rights Commission over the past year have uncovered dozens of mass graves and torture houses used during this period. Scores of women were targeted by military personnel, raped, sexually abused and mutilated. Wives were often arrested as "bait" to trap husbands and sons.

Last month 600 people attended a human rights victims' congress in Banda Aceh. Some arrived in wheelchairs or hobbled on crutches, others were carried by family members. Many women came alone.

Rasyidah was 19 years old when soldiers burst into the family home, savagely beat then killed her mother, who they suspected was a rebel sympathiser. Rasyidah and her pregnant sister were imprisoned in the rumah geudong, or torture house, where they were repeatedly raped, beaten and tortured. When she was released five months later, Rasyidah returned to find her home had been burnt to the ground. She remains confused and easily disoriented, the result of severe beatings to her head.

Last spring, Ms Cut Nur became the only woman on GAM's five-member Humanitarian Pause Monitoring Team. Her position involves exhaustive meetings, reviewing and verifying incident reports.

"Our province is rich, but our people are poor,"she says. "All of Aceh's wealth benefits Jakarta, while the Acehnese don't have enough to eat. We have lost too much to give up our struggle for freedom."