Indonesian government withdraws four army battalions from Aceh

Two thousand non-organic military personnel who had been assigned to fight rebels in Aceh left the region on Tuesday in accordance with the peace deal signed by the Indonesian government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) in Helsinki last month.

Local military spokesman Lt. Col. Erik Switiko said the troops left Aceh from the port in Krueng Geukeuh, around 272 kilometer from Banda Aceh, the provincial capital, at 9 a.m.

The troops' departure was witnessed by Aceh Monitoring Mission (AMM) officials, Antara news agency reported.

The four army battalions left the region on the same day after the GAM had handed over 25 percent of its weapons for destruction by the AMM.

Another army battalion is scheduled to leave the region on Wednesday, said the spokesman.

the Indonesia government will pull out 6,000 of 23,000 soldiers from Aceh province at the first phase of withdrawal this week.

The Indonesian government and the separatist GAM signed the peace pact on Aug. 15, in an effort to end a three-decade bloody conflict that has claimed over 15,000 lives, most of them being civilians.

Over 220,000 Acehnese were killed in Dec. 26 tsunami disaster last year. The two sides agreed to bring their dispute to a negotiation table following the catastrophe.

Aceh, with abundant natural resources, is a devoutly Muslim province of 4 million people with a long history of revolt against central authorities. One of the issues of the conflict is about the split of the revenue from the natural gas production.

Source: Xinhua