Dow Jones Newsiwres
11 May, 2003

JAKARTA--International negotiators made a last-ditch effort Sunday to save a peace pact in the restive Indonesian province of Aceh, despite the arrest of four top rebel leaders accused of involvement in a series of bombings across the archipelago.

Police said the four leaders of the Free Aceh Movement would be charged under a new anti-terrorism law. They were detained Friday as they attempted to leave the province.

Baktiar Abdullah, a rebel spokesman, condemned the arrests as "slanderous," but officials with the Geneva-based Henry Dunant Center, which brokered the Dec. 9 peace agreement, remained hopeful that the two sides could return to the negotiating table and avert a return to war.

David Gorman, representative of the Henry Dunant Center in Aceh, said peace negotiators were meeting separately in Banda Aceh, the provincial capital, with both sides ahead of the government's Monday deadline for the rebels to put down their weapons and accept autonomy instead of independence. The rebels have called for talks to be held after Monday.

"We're still talking with the government and seeing what types of last-minute achievements can be made," Gorman said. "We're doing whatever we can to avoid renewed fighting. People here are generally very troubled and concerned. Both sides realize how important it is that we try and at least see if it is possible to resolve the differences."

In a hopeful sign, Gorman said his staff and 50 Thai and Filipino peace monitors would remain in the province. There were reports Saturday that the monitors would leave the province as early as Sunday.

"We're all still here. We're waiting and seeing," Gorman said. "If we're notified by the government that we should leave, then we'll leave. But we're still awaiting the outcome of these efforts."

The five-month-old pact has appeared to unravel in recent days, as the government announced it was sending more troops to the province and had readied a presidential decree allowing it to "launch a security operation" in the province.

Rebels issued a statement calling on their fighters to return to their bases and for citizens to halt all activities starting Monday. The rebels have 3,000 to 10,000 troops in the province, while the government has more than 30,000 troops.

The peace pact was signed with much fanfare, and in its first few months effectively ended the 26-year civil war.

But violence has intensified in the past two months, with both sides accusing the other of violating the agreement.