Turtle slaughter

Tanjung Benoa, on the southeast coast of Bali, is the centre of a deadly illegal trade in tortoiseshell and meat that is threatening to exterminate one of the world's most ancient species. At the turn of the last century the region was home to up to one third of the world's turtles. Slaughter especially over the past ten years has reduced this to five percent. Indonesia signed a convention to ban international trade in turtles, but gave special dispensation to Bali in the form of a 5,000-animal annual quota. Conservationists claim businessmen then flocked to the island and began abusing this quota. The leading trader in Tanjung is Widji Zakariah, a Chinese-Indonesian. Local opposition is starting to mount, however. One Tanjung businessman regularly buys turtles from the traders and releases them back into the ocean. Balinese religious leaders are calling to stop the trade. Campaigners are considering a 'boycott Bali' movement.

John Aglionby, The Guardian [UK], 24 November 2000

Going, gone

Organisers of Indonesia's biggest art scam cancelled their planned auction of so-called long-lost masterpieces at the last minute after objections from local art critics. The biggest collection of European and famous Indonesian masters ever to be displayed in Indonesia included two Van Goghs, two Picassos, a Modgliani, a Monet and a Chagall. According to the collector, they were all found on plantations or flea markets all over the archipelago during a twenty-year hunt. The National Gallery said not one of the paintings was an original. Art critics say that although the copies are not particularly good ones, organisers must have thought they could pull off Indonesia's biggest-ever fake scam because it is such a lucrative business in Indonesia. 'This is like a festival of forgeries. It's the biennial exhibition for all of Indonesia's forgers,' said National Gallery curator Amir Sidharta. 'It's like the label syndrome. In Indonesia, we have fake jeans, fake CDs, fake handbags and now, fake art works. Indonesians really like the artificial ones.'

Marianne Kearney, The Straits Times, 25 November 2000

News TV

Indonesia's first 24-hour news channel flickered to life on Jakarta television sets late in November 2000, beaming the country's first-ever Chinese language broadcasts into homes. Trilingual Metro TV, the brainchild of newspaper publisher Suryo Paloh, broadcasts one-hour Mandarin and English news programs sandwiched between Indonesian-language bulletins and talk shows. Equally ambitious is Metro TV's planned content, with a satellite link-up between separatist leaders and generals in the republic's rebellious peripheries of Aceh and Irian Jaya and top government figures in Jakarta planned for the opening night. East Timor's president-in-waiting Xanana Gusmao will also be beamed in for the debut transmission. Slow news days don't figure in news director Andy Noya's concerns. 'There's too much news here. Flooding disasters, conflicts in Irian, in Ambon, this group slaughtered by that group. So much financial news, then Jakarta's bombs and demos and stress.' Bankers and policy makers are Metro's target audience, so economic news will dominate, Noya says.

AFP, 25 November 2001

Child's Eye

Sixty children of Malay, Dayak, Madurese, and Chinese ethnic backgrounds in West Kalimantan held an exhibition of their photographs at the Pontianak museum in November 2000. They were the children of bus conductors, fishermen and basketmakers, school dropouts and children from refugee camps. The exhibition was the fruit of collaboration between Child's Eye, a network of non-governmental organisations in West Kalimantan, and the Forum of Volunteers from West Kalimantan, with support from the British Council. With just a pocket camera, the children were given the opportunity to talk about their daily lives. Children from a refugee camp tell about their lives: limited clean water, small huts, and scabies. In one, a child is squatting, holding a small banner that reads: 'We love peace/ ethnic groups/ racial groups/ religion.' The caption says: 'This banner is held by a child refugee who loves peace. His name is Adam, aged 10, and he earns a living as a scavenger.'

Erma S Ranik, Jakarta Post, 5 December 2000

Sexy solution

Indonesian PhD student Mulyoto Pangestu has devised a simple, long-term and cheap way to store sperm. It costs less than 50 Australian cents a specimen, relies on common materials like plastic straws and aluminium-foil pouches, and requires no special handling. Yet the specimens last for years and remain potent. Jillian Shaw, his supervisor at the Monash Institute of Reproduction and Development, on the outskirts of Melbourne, says: 'Finding this exceedingly cheap way of doing this - that is a big breakthrough'. The discovery will be particularly useful for scientists and doctors in developing countries, who often don't have access to the expensive refrigeration equipment and coolant needed for traditional techniques. Pangestu willingly failed for nearly six months, until he realised the process had to occur without any oxygen. A patent for Pangestu's invention is now pending.

Becky Gaylord, Far Eastern Economic Review, 21 December 2000.

Condoms compulsory

Authorities in Irian Jaya plan to make the use of condoms compulsory for extra-marital sex. Jakarta-appointed Irian Jaya Governor J P Solossa said that the obligatory use of condoms was aimed at curbing the spread of Aids. He gave no details on how the regulation would be policed, but said violators would be punished. Irian Jaya province has one of Indonesia's highest rates of HIV/Aids sufferers. Health office estimates put the prevalence of AIDS in Irian Jaya at 4.86 per 100,000 people, or 25 times the national average of 0.2 per 100,000 people. Irian Jaya is the base for many large fishing operations that employ foreign fishermen from Thailand, Taiwan and China.

AFP, 22 January 2001

History lesson

The history of sex crimes committed by occupying Japanese soldiers during World War II will soon be incorporated into the curriculum taught to Indonesian students. The non-governmental Legal Aid Institute (LBH) in Yogyakarta proposed the topic of how Indonesian women were forced into sexual slavery for Japanese soldiers from 1942 to 1945. Few Indonesians, including old people, know that Indonesians were among some 200,000 women across East Asia who were made sexual slaves by the Japanese imperial army. A total of 1,156 former comfort women now live in Java and East Nusa Tenggara. But the number may even be higher, as some women want to bury the past. 'We want the Japanese government to express its regret for what they did to us,' says 71 year-old Mardiyem, one of hundreds forced to become comfort women in Yogyakarta.

Richel Dursin, IPS, 31 January 2001