(4 Dec 2000) Indonesian/Nat
There were peaceful celebrations in the Aceh province of Jeunib, on Monday as villagers marked the 24th anniversary of their struggle for independence.
The Free Aceh Movement raised rebel flags, vowing to keep up their 24 year-long fight for freedom.
The leader of the Free Aceh Movement Tengku, Abdullah Syafi'i, continued the appeal to the international community to support the Acehnese push for an independent nation.
However, elsewhere around Aceh, the celebrations weren't as peaceful.
Indonesian police forcibly removed hundreds of separatist flags, as rebels celebrated in the province.
Villagers said security forces shot at rebel flags hoisted secretly overnight along main roads before tearing them down.
While in the north of the province, police say an officer was shot dead and another injured in a gunbattle with rebels.
Witnesses say a motorcyclist was gunned down by security forces on Sunday night in Indrajaya district, east of the provincial capital of Banda Aceh.
But Superintendent Kusbini of the joint police-military task force blamed rebels of the Free Aceh Movement for the man's death, saying they had attacked three military outposts during the night.
The authorities have warned they would crack down on any public celebrations marking December 4, 1976, the day when separatists unilaterally declared the province's independence from Indonesia.
Since then, efforts by security forces to suppress the insurgents have largely backfired.
Although at least 5,500 people have died as a result of the war during the past decade, the separatists have managed to attract wide public support in the province of 4.1 million people.
Rebels maintain that the region on the northern tip of Sumatra island has become a virtual colony of Indonesia's dominant island of Java.
They claim that Aceh's substantial oil and natural gas reserves have been exploited by Jakarta's political and military elite and that few benefits have returned to the region.
Indonesia's leaders have consistently ruled out demands for an independent Aceh, fearing it would lead to the disintegration of the sprawling, ethnically diverse Southeast Asian nation.
President Abdurrahman Wahid has instead offered the staunchly Muslim province wide-ranging autonomy and the possibility of introducing Islamic Sharia law.
SOUNDBITE: (Indonesian)
"I'm asking the international community to help us and to support the Free Aceh Movement for the democracy and sovereignty of the Acehnese nation."
SUPERCAPTION: Tengku Abdullah Syafi'i, Leader of Free Aceh Movement
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