The Wire

The New York based organisation Human Rights Watch released a report last week confirming that the Indonesian armed forces – the TNI – are systematically torturing detainees in Aceh. However, the military torture highlighted in this report is only a skimming of the atrocities occurring across the Indonesian periphery, where separatist movements are rebelling for independence, or at least autonomy. Indonesia won’t budge. Since its ‘loss’ of East Timor, it doesn’t want any other provinces to claim independence, and is doing everything it can to stop separatist movements from gaining power. Bronwyn Herbert spoke to Dr Damien Kingsbury, an Indonesian political specialist from Deakin University in Melbourne.