INTRODUCTION Local Government Bureucracies' Perspective on Disaster Diplomacy As A Mode of Cooperation Among States : Case Study Yogyakarta Special Region Indonesia
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border performed in manufacturing activities of goods and materials, activities of design,
engineering, sorting, initial inspection, inal inspection and packing of goods and
materials imported or goods and materials from Indonesian customs area or Daerah
Pabean Indonesia Lainnya DPIL, which results mainly for export purposes. Although
this area is neither join development area nor place near the state border, through this
example, it will show the special treatment applied to this area. The special treatment
allows some parole to enter and remove goods activities. Included also in this group
is the Customs Area. Customs area is an area with certain limits in sea ports, airports,
and other places which were assigned for export and import goods under the Direktorat
Jenderal Bea dan Cukai sulveilance.
The cases above showed that the management of natural resources are mostly
for economic purpose, because of people can see the direct economic beneits through its
masive national revenue. Until nowadays, oil is used as important source of power plants,
and other production and consumption activities of humans. The availability of oil
and enegy balance, and also its distribution is unwell distributed through the world, it makes
the oil become a very important commodity and has strategic value in economy and
politics. Oil has relation with important matters, such as inlation, economic growth,
unemployment, trade and foreign policy orientation of a state. In result, anything that
has relation with oil and natural gas, will be the top priority issue in both exporter and
importer countries. Because of this beneits, the border land which has abundant natural
resources will be an interesting object for the countries sharing the border to be disputed or
became join cooperation.
BORDER AREA IS A COMMON SPACE INTRA SPACE FOR MANY STATES INTRA
STATES, NOT ONLY BETWEEN TWO STATES
As written before, this paper would try to explore the posibility of border dispute as
not only about the interests of two states who share the same border, but also can involve
multiple states who do not have direct border. To explain this phenomena, the writer will
show from the case below:
First, wars that happened in Arab countries caused masive waves of refugees.
The continuity of war in Syria cause the emergence of refugees management issue
in several states in Middle East and Europe. Civilians in Syria have to take refugee to the
safe zone and non-ly zone that have been agreed between the disputants. Most of the
refugees led to Turkey because of Erdogan, president of Turkey, applied open door policy
that believed to provide betterment for the Syrian refugees. This policy is not applied in
other countries arround Syria, such as Israel, Quwait, and Saudi Arabia. Although the low
of refugees could cause another problem for Turkey, as in some regions the Syrian
refugees have outnumber the local people.
Turkey become the destination for the refugees as Turkey can be the entrance gate to
European countries. In Europe, the refugees expect to get asylum status. In some Middle
East countries have strict regulation about asylum seeker, except for staying in refugee
camps. This strict regulation in some countries like Oman, Quwait, and Qatar, was caused
by imbalace composition of local people and foreign worker for South Asia. Turkey became
a transit place for refugees before they go to Europe because the realised that Turkey
could not afford to accpet more refugees from Syria, as previously Turkey also became the
destination for another refugees from Iraq
and Afghanistan. There is no employment and proper life if these refugees keep staying
at the refugee camps, unless they cross to Europe to seek for asylum.
Another factor that made Turkey as the main refugee route, although there is Egypt
that can be the route to Europe, is not only because the open door policy of Tukey and
asylum status offered by some European countries might varies based on the route
they took, but also because of the refugee route in Lebanon has been closed since
last October. The government of Lebanon decided to close the route because of the
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number of refugees were already burdenizing the country. Meanwhile, the government of
Jordania also found dificulty in dealing with the refugees, and resulting in bad condition
of refugees in camps. Jordania was not a good place for transit as Saudi Arabia and
Quwait do not give any asylum. Beside the asylum issue, there is also sectarian issue
that will bring more dificulty for Saudi Arabia
and Quwait, so the low of refugees stoped at Jordania.
The space for Syrian refugees did not automatically given, but because it was a
political commodity among the European states. Angela Merkel called for other
inluential politicians in Europe to be more open in their border policy and more supportive
to the Syrian refugees, based on the quota calculation that the increasing number of
the refugees was unavoidable. However, this noble idea can be failed if Hungary’s
plan to build 1,755 kilometeres of wall were implemented and refusal policy toward
refugees were signed. Hungarian Foreign Affairs Minister stated that the presence of
refugee would bring more harm for the state’s economy and security. This wall is planed to
block the low of refugees using the Serbia- Hungary route before continuing the journey
to more prosperous counties like German and France. Hungary insisted theta they have the
right to protect their country from the potential domestic disruption.
German became the favorite destinations for asylum seekers since this
country givesa bigger quota for refugees than other European countries. This policy,
according to Washington Post and BBC, is a win-win solution for the demographic problem
of German in which this country needs young and skilled labors. In its demographic data, in
near future German will lack of labors to ill the need of the industry.
Another example of refugee case and border problems also happened in Southeast
Asia. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees UNHCR in Indonesia stated that
there is an increasing number of refugees came to Indonesia in the recent years.
The Head of UNHCR representation in Indonesia, Thomas Vargas, predicted the
increasing number of refugees was caused by several problems. First is the conlict in
several countries. The conlicts in Myanmar, Afghanistan, and Syria are more unlikely close
to an end. There is a cycle when ships are more to be used to ship the refugees between
October to May. Outside of this season, the lows of refugees are lower because of the
climate and weather. The ship accomodated people with different background, migrants,
refugees, and asylum seekers. They all led with different motives and purposes. UNHCR
data showed that until June 2015 there are 13,188 people who became their concern.
Among those people, 5,277 of them are refugees and 7,911 are asylum seekers. Most
of them led from the conlict and human right
violation in their coutries such as Afghanistan, Myanmar, Somali, Iran, and Iraq.
Facing this problem, Indonesia is considering to provide one island to proceed
the refugees who were captured on their way to Australia. This effort makes Indonesia the
third country that offered assistance regarding the strict Australia’s immigration policy.
The Coordinating Ministry of Politics, Law and Security stated that the government
has already created a small team to discuss the probability of providing an island for the
refugees, and ask Australia government to fund this project. The discussion that planned
to be held at the end of 2015 will also discuss about terrorism and trading issues.
The refugee problem is a serious problem faced by the government of Indonesia
and Australia. The relation of both countries became tense as Tony Abbot sending back the
ships full of asylum seekers to Indonesia. This policy became popular in Australia, however
irritated the Indonesia government who saw this problem as violation of sovereignty.
Regarding to the refugees form Myanmar and Bangladesh, Indonesia called for international
community to share the burden in helping the refugees.
Related to the refugee problem, Australia received many critics from United
Nations and other Human Rights groups about its hardline policy in dealing with
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refugee. Since 2012, Australia sent the refugees who came by boats to the camp in
Nauru, an reported that there were attacks and systematic violation toward to refugees.
Other than that, there is also camp in Manus Island in Papua New Guinea where Australia
built refugee camps in this island. Papua New Guinea government stated that the refugees
were hold in these controvertial camps and will be settled in this island. Despite of the
under spotlighttreatment regarding Australia’s action towards the refugees in this island,
the refugees were forbidden to enter the Australian territory regardless their status as
refugees.
Since the camp was opened in Manus island under the instruction of Labor Party
three years ago, about 50 of asylum seekers were accepted. And based on the immigration
data, more than 900 men were hold in Manus island, and about 600 men, women, and
children wer hold in Nauru. The people in Manus island were placed, accomodated,
and funded by the Australian government, but were not permitted to work and leave the
island.
Since the processing camp in Manus Islands has been opened by Australian Labor
Party 3 years ago, there have been reported around 50 asylum seekers whose applications
are accepted. However, there are more than 900 men under detention in Mnaus Islands,
600 men, women, and children are under detention in Nauru. Those under detention
in Manus get inancial support from Australia despite the regulation for not being able to
work. They may leave the home but remain staying at this island.
Thus, what would be the lesson learned? Indeed, border area is not only about
interests representation of two neighborhood states. There may have been external actors
involved within. Not only Europe who get the impacts of Turkey’s opening border policy, but
also Oman, Quwait, and Qatar.
Australia relies heavily on the border security system in all parts of Indonesian
in dealing with refugee problems and its negative impacts to their nations.
Australia also needs Papua New Guinea in order to provide a shelter to those
refugees who want to migrate to Australia. Then, we could say that border area
is a common space for intra states, not only between states. It needs a careful attention,
support, and cooperation from many states surrounding the border zones. Therefore,
border diplomacy needs to be conducted not only through bilateral effort but also
multilateral effort.
There is no other reason for the local government and the other governments to
avoid dealing with development in that area. Government are obliged to develop the area
under a cooperative framework between two states, and even in the intra state.
In the future, if the bilateral cooperation in the border area could run smoothly, it
could therefore be adopted into multilateral cooperation especially to the states who have
border problem in regional level.
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