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$Unique_ID{bob00219}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{Indonesia
Chapter 4C.   Political Organizations}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Riga Adiwoso-Suprapto}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{political
party
pancasila
government
golkar
indonesian
ppp
soeharto
parties
leadership}
$Date{1982}
$Log{}
Title:       Indonesia
Book:        Indonesia, A Country Study
Author:      Riga Adiwoso-Suprapto
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1982

Chapter 4C.   Political Organizations

     Political activities must be channeled through a legally prescribed
system consisting of what Soeharto has called "the three legitimate political
organizations"-the ruling Golkar and the two opposition parties. Any activity
taking place outside this tripartite arrangement is illegal. The rationale
behind the arrangement, in place since 1973, is that, given the country's
ethnic, cultural, and regional diversity, the multiplicity of political
parties catering to parochial interests would hinder the process of political
and economic stabilization. Unmitigated partisan political strife would be
seen as hardening and even widening the country's sociopolitical cleavages. In
the early 1980s the tripartite system continued to fulfill the political
requirement of the Soeharto leadership as the best possible means of
developing "pancasila democracy." Opposition groups were guarded, however,
because any criticism of the system would be viewed as an attempt to undermine
the constitutional and ideological foundation of the state.

     Party politics were among the major targets of reforms after Soeharto's
rise to power in 1966. Initially, the official intention was to create a
two-party structure, but in view of strong objections by various party
leaders, a new plan was offered so that all parties could come under three
major groupings. As a prelude to a reorganization, the government in 1970
called on all parties to contest the parliamentary elections of July 1971 on
the basis of a three-way realignment. The first grouping would be associated
with the supposedly neutral, nonpolitical, and secularist Golkar, whose
officially assigned mission was to "engage in politics to suppress politics";
the second grouping, described as "spiritual," would embrace all Muslim
parties; and the third, identified as "nationalist," would represent the
remaining parties. Despite serious reservations, the nine parties of the day-
five nationalist and four religious-agreed to contest the elections under the
new format, provided that they were allowed to retain their individual party
identities. In the first test of electoral strength in 1971, Golkar-little
known then outside Jakarta and other major cities-surprised many by scoring a
landslide victory.

     Golkar's victory proved demoralizing for the other parties, and in fact
it signaled the collapse of multiparty politics. Weakened by internal fissures
within each party, not to mention government pressure, the nine parties
finally in January 1973 were obliged to merge into two new parties: the
Development Unity Party (PPP) and the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI). In
doing so the two parties have pledged-over muted protests within each group-
that they would no longer question the validity of pancasila and the
Constitution and that their political programs would be formulated
accordingly.

     Interestingly, whereas the PPP and the PDI are officially referred to as
"parties," Golkar is not. Apparently, this practice derives from the negative
image the government attaches to the term "political party" as an instrument
of self-seeking associated with parochial interests. Another interesting
aspect is the government's refraining from using the term "opposition."
Evidently, this stems from the belief that politics should be guided by, as
Soeharto put it, "a true family spirit" of consultation, consensus, unity, and
mutual aid; such family spirit has been officially extolled as the
quintessence of pancasila. Viewed from the official perspective, there can be
no manifestations of opposition or adversary politicking in the "big family"
that is Indonesia. There may be political differences, but according to Amir
Murtono, a retired major general who in 1982 directed Golkar under the title
of general chairman, "different opinions do not imply an attitude of
opposition."

     Indeed, the concept of family togetherness has been embraced with utmost
seriousness by the Soeharto leadership. Efforts to induce the PPP and the PDI
to cooperate with Golkar have been extensive-these in addition to measures
taken to reinforce Golkar's already formidable grip on the political
structure. A familiar part of these efforts has been to lend support to
"nonpolitical" moderates within each party and to undercut the strength of
those elements still disposed toward "old-fashioned" politics. Evidently,
this tactic has worked, as indicated by the ascendancy of factions in both
parties considered to be amenable to the government's wishes. In the early
1980s Soeharto readily acknowledged that some people were not satisfied with
the existing tripartite party system, without which, he warned the nation in
August 1981, the country would revert to "the bitter times of the past, the
era of dozens of parties." In the following month he let it be known that any
attempt to create a new party outside the existing framework would be in
violation of the law.

Golkar

     Golkar is a creation of the military and remains under its dominance. The
organization had its beginning in 1964 when army officers formed it to counter
the growing power of the Indonesian Communist Party and that group's front
organizations. By 1969 it had been brought under government control as a
political machine with which to co-opt various social groups and provide a
broad base for the military-dominated Soeharto government. In that year Golkar
claimed to speak for about 270 groups supposedly representing farmers,
workers, youths and students, women, fishermen, crewmen, businessmen, civil
servants, professionals, intellectuals, veterans, and members of the armed
forces. After the 1971 elections this loose federation of functional groups
was reorganized on a "nonpartisan" basis in an effort to tighten internal
discipline and to make it more responsive to unified leadership under a
central executive board, which was to be assisted by a central advisory board,
of which Soeharto remained chairman in 1982. These two bodies in late 1982
continued to be composed of generals, cabinet ministers, and senior civilian
technocrats.

     Golkar's rapid ascendancy is not surprising, given ABRI's active support
for the organization. All civil servants were urged to join Golkar, for
there was to be no neutrality or nonpartisanship where the government's
development strategy was concerned. The government at the regional level saw
to it that credits, loans, and fertilizers were given preferentially to those
willing to be, or believed to be, supporters of Golkar. Furthermore, Golkar
benefited considerably from the ban on organizing mass support at the village
level. This measure kept all political workers out of the rural areas-a
potential reservoir of support for the PPP-so that the mass of the people
would remain unpoliticized between elections every five years. Yet Golkar was
able to bring its "nonpartisan" influence to bear on the people, if
indirectly, through local military and civil authorities who maintained an
extensive web of patron-client relations with local leaders.

     Golkar influence was strengthened under a political party law that went
into effect in August 1975. Adopted after several months of acrimonious debate
between Golkar and the PPP, this law formally recognized Golkar, the PPP, and
the PDI as the only three legal political organizations with rights to
participate in parliamentary and regional elections. Any activity other than
that permitted within the tripartite party structure would constitute
"opposition" to the state, its pancasila, and the Constitution. The law
contained several concessions, however, in view of strong representation by
the two parties. Islam was recognized as an organizing principle for the PPP
so long as pancasila was not questioned as the basic ideology of the state,
and the three political organizations were permitted to have their
representatives in the villages. In addition, the 1975 bill banned top-level
government officials down to the district level from joining any political
organization except with written permission. This was intended ostensibly to
keep the top layer of the bureaucracy unpoliticized, but its practical effect
has been to dissuade top officials from supporting the two opposition parties
and to constrain them to back Golkar. Lower rank officials needed only to
inform their superiors in joining an organization, however. In 1982 it was
unclear whether the political party law was strictly enforced. In an interview
with the Far Eastern Economic Review shortly after the May 1982 elections,
Vice President Adam Malik gave the impression that the political organizations
were still not allowed to carry out activities at the village level except
during election campaigns and that partisan politicking would remain
proscribed until the country reached a higher level of political maturity.

     In the parliamentary elections of May 1977, Golkar campaigned on a
platform reflecting the aims and development-centered policies of the
government and repeated its impressive performance of 1971. The military again
played a key role in mobilizing votes for Golkar candidates. In late 1982
Golkar's status as the government's so-called "partner" and principal
political vehicle appeared likely to continue. In the parliamentary elections
held in May, it improved on its share of popular votes from the 1977 level of
62.1 percent to 64.3 percent, returning 246 seats out of the total contested
seats of 364. It could additionally count on support from 75 appointed members
from the armed forces and perhaps as many as 15 more appointed members
representing various functional and regional constituencies. The jubilant
government leaders maintained that Golkar's landslide victory was irrefutable
proof of popular endorsement of Soeharto's policies and leadership. Critics
wondered aloud, though, whether Golkar could have fared that well without the
advantage of solid bureaucratic blessings and support.

Development Unity Party

     The PPP is a loose assemblage of four old Muslim parties, which until
1973 competed for electoral support not only among themselves but also against
non-Muslim parties. The 1973 merger notwithstanding, the four parties
continued to maintain their separate party identity, reflecting the
circumstances of their sectarian stance and regional roots. In 1982 two of the
four parties were still considered to be more influential than the others.
There were the Muslim Scholars League (NU), the traditionalist group that had
been popular in eastern and central Java; and the Indonesian Muslim Party
(Parmusi), successor to the Council of Indonesian Muslim Associations
(Masyumi), which had been banned in 1960 for refusing to endorse Sukarno's
Guided Democracy. (It was not until 1968 that the Sumatra-based Masyumi was
allowed by the Soeharto government to resume its activity under the new name
of Parmusi.) The two remaining members were the Indonesian Islamic Association
Party, with scattered support in western Java, southern Sumatra, and Sulawesi;
and the Islamic Education Party, based mainly in Sumatra.

     The PPP is not an Islamic alliance against Soeharto, since the 1973
merger was dictated more or less by the government. Apart from the commonality
of Islam, it has been divided along sectarian and regional grounds, having
neither a populist leader nor an effective platform that could be embraced in
earnest by all groups. Besides, the concept of an orthodox Islamic state
seemed unappealing to the majority of Indonesian Muslims.

     Nonetheless, the authorities have been ever watchful of the possibility
of a resurgent Islam and the possibility of Muslim groups of all persuasions
uniting against the secularist Soeharto government. Given the potential of
Islam's being politicized as the rallying point of antigovernment actions,
official policy has been, however, one of accommodation rather than
confrontation. Thus, when confronted with the strong sentiments within the
PPP favoring the adoption of the Kaabah (Islam's holy shrine at Mecca) as the
party's official symbol, official objections were withdrawn. Another example
was the 1975 concession whereby Islam was allowed to be mentioned as an
underlying principle of the PPP-but along with pancasila. The tolerant policy,
which was premised on the view that Islam could become a constructive force
for national unity so long as it was not exploited as a political tool, was
brought into question after the 1977 elections in which the PPP not only
outpolled Golkar in the national capital region but also fared well elsewhere.
In 1978 the Department of Religious Affairs was placed under an army general,
PPP representatives were dropped from the cabinet, and the government
intensified the effort to expand Muslim representation through Golkar. Another
tactic was to have frequent dialogues with PPP leaders and to lend support to
the moderate nonpolitical Muslims within the PPP against those who were
believed to be orthodox hardliners.

     The PPP has sought to improve its image as the true defender and promoter
of Islam. Some of its election campaigners in fact insisted occasionally that
a vote for Golkar was a vote for the heathen. A notable tendency has been an
emphasis since the late 1970s on socioeconomic issues, as the party has
attempted to broaden its popular appeal. Articulated more among younger
Muslims than the older generation, these issues were related to the growing
popular perception of a widening gap between haves and have-nots and of
corruption in government. Another issue on which the PPP was taking a strong
stand was whether gambling should be allowed to flourish in cities. Gambling
was denounced as contrary to Quranic teaching and even to pancasila. Devout
Muslims were joined by many university students in demanding a government ban
on it-the latter group apparently because of the fact that the people most
often frequenting casinos were believed to be Chinese. In any case, the
party's growing interest in socioeconomic issues appeared to indicate its
realistic recognition that the task of party-building necessitated greater
sensitivity to practical matters.

     Factional infighting appeared to be a continuing problem for the party.
In the early 1980s the party was still split on how to define the nature of
its relationship with the government, which had sought to influence party
affairs through "friendly dialogue" with PPP leaders. A dialogue of this
nature took place intermittently through an advisory Indonesian Ulemas Council
set up in 1975 or directly between the party leaders on the one side and the
ministers in charge of religious affairs and home affairs and the head of
Kopkamtib on the other, depending on the nature of problems at hand. Whether
because of the dialogue or because of the party's independent assessment, the
PPP in August 1981 announced its decision to support Soeharto as the nominee
for the presidential election slated for March 1983. On balance, the group
favoring cooperation with the government-Parmusi-appeared to be quite
assertive in intraparty affairs, despite its minority status within the PPP.
This was evident in November 1981 when Parmusi prepared the list of PPP
parliamentary candidates for the May 1982 elections without consulting the
majority NU. The NU filed a protest with the minister of home affairs, who is
responsible for the management of general elections as head of the General
Election Institute. The minister was called on to reject the list, which was
said to have been drawn up to favor the progovernment Parmusi candidates. The
protest was rejected on the grounds that the list submitted was legal and
that, in any event, the government should not intervene in the party's
"internal disputes." The NU threatened to boycott the 1982 elections; the
threat was later withdrawn, but the damage-the widely perceived malleability
of some PPP leaders in government hands-had been done. In the 1982 election
the PPP did not fare as well as it had hoped (see The New Order since 1978,
this ch.).

Indonesian Democratic Party

     The Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) is an amalgamation of three
nationalist and two Christian parties; the Indonesian Nationalist Party
(PNI); the Indonesian Christian Party (Parkindo); the Catholic Party; the
Association of the Supporters of Indonesian Independence (IPKI); and the
Party of the Masses (Murba). The PNI, founded by Sukarno, was traditionally
strong in eastern and central Java and Jakarta-especially among the Javanese
civil servants and hence resented by non-Javanese in the Outer Islands. The
anticommunist Parkindo represented the Protestant Christian minorities in
the eastern islands and the Batak area of Sumatra. The Catholic Party drew
much of its strength from the eastern Lesser Sunda Islands and parts of Java.
The IPKI was strongly anticommunist. Murba was leftist but not communist.

     Given its heterogeneous background, the PDI has since its 1973 merger
been troubled by factional feuding, especially within the dominant PNI
component. Personality clashes made it difficult for the PDI to devise a
coherent program or an effective leadership. In November 1978, for example,
then-PDI leader, Sanusi Hardjadinata, dismissed Sunawar Sukowati, a leading
PNI figure, from a 21-member central leadership body on the grounds of having
established rival PDI branches at the provincial level. Confronted with the
imminency of the party's disintegration, Kopkamtib and Bakin were constrained
to intervene thereafter in party affairs ostensibly as peacemakers or
arbiters. The intervention was perhaps unavoidable if only because the
government had counted on the PDI to neutralize the PPP. The collapse of the
PDI would have meant the squaring of Golkar against the PPP-and the
possibility of polarizing the political scene along the lines of secularism
versus Islam.

     Intra-PDI conflict persisted through 1980 until the party's national
congress convened in January 1981 to formalize a shift in leadership, which
had in fact been consumated by late 1980. The congress formally elected
Sukowati as the party's new general chairman and pledged full support for the
Soeharto leadership as the best means of continuing stability and development.
The new leadership also expressed unqualified endorsement of pancasila as the
sole guiding principle of the PDI; obviously this was an affront to other
PNI adherents who were still attached to Sukarno's concept of Marhaenism
(see Sukarno and the National Movement, ch. 1). The new leadership also
announced its decision to support the nomination of Soeharto for another
term in 1983.

     The mainstream PDI group under Sunawar Sukowati sought to rationalize
its progovernment stand by maintaining that the New Order political system
was merely an improvement on Sukarno's system and not a contradiction or
discontinuity. But dissidents led by Abdul Madjid, a confirmed Sukarno
loyalist, leveled charges of sellout at the new leadership group. In 1982
the intraparty tensions appeared likely to persist, compounded by the party's
dismal performance in the May 1982 elections. The reduction of its
parliamentary representation from 10 to six in the party's stronghold in
central Java proved to be a major psychological setback. Although it still
managed to return a total of 24 seats (29 in 1977), the PDI was undergoing a
period of soul-searching about its identity, future, and relationship with
the Soeharto administration.

Pancasila

     The widely held political values of the Indonesian people reflect a
synthesis of the traditional Hindu-Buddhist-Islamic influences, modern
nationalist ideology, and to an extent Western notions of democracy and
popular participation. Tradition weighs heavily in grass-roots perceptions
of authority, power, control, and social harmony. To some persons, the
value system is seemingly incompatible with the Western tradition of
political liberalism and accountability because of its authoritarian,
paternalistic bent. But Indonesian nationalists and intellectuals who fought
for independence and then led the nation found that the traditional and
Western strains of political ideas were not altogether mutually exclusive.
They became convinced that democracy was not the monopoly or invention of
Western countries and that the Indonesian people had their own democratic
concepts and practices based on consultation, deliberation, and consensus
in the spirit of family togetherness.

     The attributes of indigenous democracy do no readily lend themselves
to the evolution of a political system based on freely expressed desire for
political accountability, representation, or participation. Most Indonesians
do not subscribe to the Western notion that people are born equal and that
society should be egalitarian. Clear hierarchies of social division are
seen as a part of the cosmic order, and authoritarianism is accepted,
sometimes fatalistically, so long as it is perceived to be tempered by
fairness and benevolence.

     In practical terms the time-honored value structure based on deference
to authority and acceptance of hierarchy has been conducive to the evolution
of paternalistic leadership. It is also expressed in the popular desire for
government employment; preoccupation with prestige, status, and wealth; and an
almost exclusive concentration of political power in Jakarta. Leadership in
the sense of political tutelage from the top, or in the manner of patriarchal
dictates within a family or clan, came to constitute the foundation of
Sukarno's Guided Democracy, which he said was "democracy with leadership,
but still democracy."

     Since 1966 Soeharto has essentially continued his predecessor's aphorism
that democracy without leadership is anarchy. Realizing Sukarno's mistakes,
Soeharto has sought to strike a balance between leadership and democracy
by proclaiming that "leadership without democracy is dictatorship." In
his effort to rationalize the need for a balance between the two political
aspects, Soeharto has turned to the ideology of pancasila, which was first
enunciated by Sukarno in a June 1945 speech and later incorporated into the
preamble to the 1945 Constitution.

     As envisaged by its formulators, pancasila was to become the
unifying symbol for the country's numerous and widely scattered ethnic and
religious groups. In listing the five universally appealing concepts of belief
in one God, humanitarianism, national unity, democracy, and social justice,
however, the formulators did not give precise definitions of these concepts,
rendering pancasila susceptible to varying interpretations. There was no
question, however, that among the principal aims of pancasila was to promote
the idea that Indonesia, though predominantly Islamic, should evolve as a
secular state. That premise remains the governing assumption of the Soeharto
leadership, but the manner in which pancasila is extolled as the fundamental
state ideology has not been without some controversy.

     Since 1967 the New Order government has sought to elevate the status
of pancasila not only as the centerpiece of Indonesian political values but
also as the ideological premise for what is called pancasila democracy. Such
a democracy was to be nourished through the indigenous practices of
consultation, consensus, and mutual aid-practices that were said to be well
suited to the development strategy of the government because of their
supposed capacity to inspire motivation and commitment. Official effort has
fallen short of arousing popular enthusiasm if only because of the vagueness
of pancasila as an ideology and of the lingering Muslim distrust of it as a
means of downgrading Islam.

     In 1978 the government launched an ambitious indoctrination program
for the popularization of pancasila. Timed to coincide with the start of the
third five-year plan, Repelita III, the program was directed by a newly
formed body called the Board for the Promotion of Education and Practicing
of Guidelines for the Perception and Implementation of Pancasila. It was
intended initially for about 2 million civil servants, whose participation
in a two-week seminar was mandatory. Later it was extended to youths,
university students, religious leaders, journalists, and businessmen.
Orientation courses were also organized for foreign businessmen to explain the
aims and rationale of pancasila and their relevance to the government's
development programs.

     Pancasila is officially presented as a system of values and a harmonious
ideal anchored on what Soeharto calls "family principle" that has "no room for
individualism, liberalism, or totalitarianism." It is supposed to guide the
Indonesians in arousing "the spirit of harmony, cohesion, unity, equality,
solidarity, and mutual assistance" in a true family spirit-and thus be the
embodiment of the Indonesian way of life, unpolluted by foreign ideas on
"individual freedom, basic rights, criticism, opposition, expression, and
democracy." In August 1979 Soeharto told the nation that Indonesia "has
often become tired and weak because of the intensity of different views among
us in responding to these ideas." He said that the people must respond to
these alien concepts with an open-minded attitude of neither accepting them
nor rejecting them outright in order to see if these ideas conform with "our
family principle" and the Indonesian patterns of thought and culture. Such an
attitude is said to be important in promoting pancasila democracy, which
Soeharto said represents the integration of "the universal democratic ideals
with our way of life," and which is "free of both domination by the majority
and tyranny of the minority." Implications of the official position have been
fairly obvious. Broadly stated, pancasila has become the criterion against
which all political concepts, traditional and foreign, and political
activities are to be measured. The government, designed to operate on
consensus rather than the foreign concept of majority rule, has become the
interpreter and enforcer of pancasila, and any activity contrary to the
ideology has come to be viewed as a threat to the constitutional stability of
the nation.

     From the official perspective, the threat to pancasila, to the
Constitution, and the state is seen as coming from "right- and left-wing
extremists"-meaning some Muslim fundamentalists and the remnants of the
outlawed PKI. In any case, despite the government reassurances that pancasila
is compatible with all religions and is not directed against Islam, tension
remains between Islam and pancasila. In the early 1980s, however, it was
difficult to ascertain how widely pancasila had been implanted in the hearts
of the Indonesians and whether this ideology, in the absence of government
sponsorship, can become a viable focus of loyalty for all Indonesians.

Foreign Affairs

     Indonesia has continued to carry out what it calls an "active and
independent foreign policy" in a prudent and pragmatic fashion. This contrasts
sharply with the 1963-65 period when Sukarno embarked on a policy of
ultranationalist and anti-Western confrontation, alienating neighboring
countries in general and Malaysia in particular, and leading the country to a
virtual anti-imperialist alliance with the communist nations and other
countries predisposed to a strident anti-Western line. That confrontation
proved to be costly at home, not only with respect to the mismanaged,
deteriorating economy; the later became a major source of mounting popular
disenchantment with the once-popular, charismatic Sukarno. Thus, the new
leadership under Soeharto, formed in the wake of the ill-fated communist coup
attempt in September 1965, has opted for a good neighbor policy, moderation,
and friendship with all nations regardless of ideological differences. This
has been done within the framework of nonalignment, which has been a major
foreign policy theme since 1955. Thereafter relations with neighboring
countries improved, and -much to the dismay of China and the Soviet Union-ties
with the United States and other Western countries were strengthened as well.

     Generally, the expansion of economic linkages with the West has been a
policy imperative since 1966. Foreign policy has been refashioned to expand
economic and technical cooperation, to create a stable regional environment,
to stay clear of any external crisis situation, and to secure a maximum degree
of freedom with which to pursue national self-interest. That freedom has been
judiciously used to promote economic links with the industrialized-chiefly
Western-nations from which to obtain capital and advanced technology. At no
time, however, has Indonesia publicly identified itself as a member of the
"Western camp," restating frequently that foreign assistance from whatever
sources should have no purposes other than complementing Indonesia's
developmental efforts.

     Ideology and cultural affinity have continued as part of the foreign
policy evolution, tempered by pragmatism. Officially, at least, Indonesia in
1982 professed no hostility on ideological grounds against any country, but
its relations with the Soviet Union were at best correct and with China,
suspended since 1967. Jakarta's caution in the early 1980s appeared to have
more to do, however, with fears of subversive activities by these powers than
a rejection of communism as an ideology. Officially, also, the country has
remained committed to the struggle against colonialism and imperialism as
expressed in the Constitution, but this posture has been largely rhetorical.
As the most populous Islamic state in the world, Indonesia has continued to
identify with the aspirations of other Islamic states and has extended full
moral support to the Arab stance on the Palestinian struggle against Israel.
On practical grounds, however, it has refrained from joining the Arab oil
embargo, maintaining that its principal export commodity should not be abused
for political ends. In a similar vein, prudence appeared to dictate the
decision in September 1980 to reject the request by the Palestine Liberation
Organization (PLO) to open a representative office in Jakarta. The Indonesian
action was reportedly prompted by the concern that the PLO's presence in
Jakarta could have disturbed, as one Indonesian source put it, "Western
interest" in the country.

     Dialogue with other nations has remained a major instrument of
diplomacy for Jakarta, which has continued to maintain, for example, that the
settlement of the Kampuchean question could be facilitated through active
dialogue with Vietnam rather than through "confrontation." The usefulness of
mutual consultation and exchange has been a major reason for the decision of
Indonesia and other members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) to inaugurate, since 1978, annual ministerial conferences with
industrialized nations, such as Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, the
United States, and the members of the European Economic Community. Relations
with these nations were close and cordial in the early 1980s, although
Indonesia seemed a bit irritated by what it regarded as Australia's misguided
and biased perceptions of the Indonesian political situation.

     Generally, foreign relations have been relatively free of frictions.
Notable exceptions have been those with China and Portugal. Diplomatic ties
with Beijing have been suspended (rather than severed) since 1967. Official
relations with Portugal, by contrast, have actually been broken off since
December 7, 1975, when Indonesian troops, officially described as
"volunteers," landed in East Timor and gained control of an area that had been
ruled by the Portuguese for over 450 years. Indonesia had been concerned that
an independent East Timor, controlled by a leftist, anti-Indonesian political
group, could pose a threat to its own security by providing an opening for
communist influence and subversion. The United Nations Security Council
immediately adopted a resolution deploring Indonesian intervention and
regretting at the same time Portugal's failure to address the issue of
self-determination for the people of East Timor. Indonesia maintained that the
people of East Timor exercised their right to self-determination in late
December 1975 when they petitioned Indonesia for integration. In July 1976
East Timor was formally annexed to Indonesia as the twenty-seventh province.