Jakarta – The chief peace monitor in Indonesia's Aceh urged exiled separatist rebel leaders on Wednesday to return as soon as possible to help strengthen the peace process in the province.
Pieter Feith, who heads a team of European Union and Southeast Asian monitors, said the Free Aceh Movement (GAM)'s top leaders could play a "very important" role in the future of the resource-rich province.
"I believe it is very important for the leadership in Stockholm to start thinking about strengthening its links to the field by coming back to Aceh soon, to visit and inspect what has been achieved," Feith told foreign correspondents.
GAM's leader Hasan di Tiro has lived in Sweden since 1979 and other top leaders have also been based there for years. Some have Swedish citizenship.
An August agreement signed in Helsinki between the Indonesian government and GAM ended 29 years of guerrilla war. The government is to withdraw all non-Acehnese troops and the guerrillas are to disarm under the pact.
So far, 243 weapons out of a total of 840 covered by the deal have been surrendered and more than 6,000 soldiers and 1,300 police officers have left the province.
The second phase of the weapons handover is scheduled to begin on Saturday.
Feith said an immediate return by GAM leaders – "even for an inspection visit" – would provide "comfort and support" to his mission objectives in Aceh.
"Most importantly, it would be immensely beneficial to the population of Aceh and particularly to the followers of the Free Aceh Movement to see their leaders come back and as soon as possible give guidance to Acehnese," he said.
Feith said key rebel negotiator Nur Juli told him during his visit last week to Aceh that he was "amazed" with public security in the province.
"I hope that this (Juli's visit) will be the beginning of a way of return and re-engagement of the Stockholm leaders back into Aceh. I told them this is in their own interest, if they wait too long, they will risk irrelevance and enter into oblivion because history in these occasions moves on very rapidly," Feith said.
He said he had no doubt that the rebels had given up their independence demand. They will be allowed to form a local political party in return.
The veteran Dutch diplomat said he was satisfied with Jakarta's commitment to the peace pact, with the inclusion of the Kopassus special forces in the first phase of the troop withdrawal. "I am encouraged... with the level of commitment showed by the government to make this process work," he said.
Commenting on rebel claims that Jakarta was still detaining about 100 former guerrillas despite a general amnesty, Feith said all concerned parties were working to solve the problem "in a consensual manner."
Indonesia's top negotiator Sofyan Jalil said last week the government was investigating the claim but Jalil suggested that rebels detained for terrorism cases would remain in prison.
Observers see the Helsinki agreement as the best chance yet of ending the conflict which has claimed about 15,000 lives, most of them civilians. GAM began its struggle for an independent state in 1976.