To The peoples Of The
World:
We, the people of Acheh, Sumatra, exercising our right
of self-determination, and protecting our historic
right of eminent domain to our fatherland, do hereby
declare ourselves free and independent from all
political control of the foreign regime of Jakarta and
the alien people of the island of Java.
Our fatherland, Acheh, Sumatra, had always been a free
and independent sovereign State since the world begun.
Holland was the first foreign power to attempt to
colonize us when it declared war against the sovereign
State of Acheh, on March 26, 1873, and on the same day
invaded our territory, aided by Javanese mercenaries.
The aftermath of this invasion was duly recorded on the
front pages of contemporary newspapers all over the
world.
The London, TIMES, on April 22, 1873, wrote:
"A remarkable incident in modern
colonial history is reported from East Indian
Archipelago. A considerable force of Europeans has been
defeated and held in check by the army of native
state...the State of Acheh. The Achehnese have gained a
decisive victory. Their enemy is not only defeated, but
compelled to withdraw."
THE NEW YORK TIMES, on May 6th, 1873,
wrote: "A sanguinary battle has taken place in Aceh, a
native Kingdom occupying the Northern portion of the
island of Sumatra. The Dutch delivered a general
assault and now we have details of the result. The
attack was repulsed with great slaughter. The Dutch
general was killed, and his army put to disastrous
flight. It appears, indeed, to have been literally
decimated."
This event had attracted powerful
world-wide attention. President Ulysses S.Grant of the
United States issued his famous Proclamation of
impartial Neutrality in this war between Holland and
Acheh.
On Christmas day, 1873, the Dutch invaded Acheh for the
second time, and thus begun what HARPER'S MAGAZINE had
called "A Hundred Years War of Today", one of the
bloodiest, and longest colonial war in human history,
during which one-half of our people had laid down their
lives defending our sovereign State. It was being
fought right up to the beginning of world war II. Eight
immediate forefathers of the signer of this Declaration
died in the battlefields of that long war, defending
our sovereign nation, all as successive rulers and
supreme commanders of the forces of the sovereign and
independent State of Acheh, Sumatra.
However, when, after World War II, the Dutch East
Indies was supposed to have been liquidate, - an empire
is not liquidated if its territorial integrity is
preserved, - our fatherland, Acheh, Sumatra, was not
returned to us. Instead, our fatherland was turned over
by the Dutch to the Javanese - their ex-mercenaries, -
by hasty flat of former colonial powers. The Javanese
are alien and foreign people to us Achehnese Sumatrans.
We have no historic, political, cultural, economic or
geographic relationship with them. When the fruits of
Dutch conquests are preserved, intact, and then
bequeathed, as it were, to the Javanese, the result is
inevitable that a Javanese colonial empire would be
established in place of that of the Dutch over our
fatherland, Acheh, Sumatra. But, colonialism, either by
white, Dutch, Europeans or by brown Javanese, Asians,
is not acceptable to the people of Acheh, Sumatra.
This illegal transfer of sovereignty over our
fatherland by the old, Dutch, colonialists to the new,
Javanese colonialists, was done in the most appalling
political fraud of the century: the Dutch colonialist
was supposed to have turned over sovereignty over our
fatherland to a "new nation" called "indonesia". But
"indonesia" was a fraud: a cloak to cover up Javanese
colonialism. Since the world begun, there never was a
people, much less a nation, in our part of the world by
that name.
No such people existed in the Malay
Archipelago by definition of ethnology, philology,
cultural anthropology, sociology, or by any other
scientific findings. "Indonesia" is merely a new label,
in a totally foreign nomenclature, which has nothing to
do with our own history, language, culture, or
interests; it was a new label considered useful by the
Dutch to replace the despicable "Dutch East Indies", in
an attempt to unite administration of their ill-gotten,
far-flung colonies; and the Javanese neo-colonialists
knew its usefulness to gain fraudulent recognition from
the unsuspecting world, ignorant of the history of the
Malay Archipelago. If Dutch colonialism was wrong, then
Javanese colonialism which was squarely based on it
cannot be right. The most fundamental principle of
international Law states: Ex injuria jus non oritur.
Right cannot originate from wrong!
The Javanese, nevertheless, are attempting to
perpetuate colonialism which all the Western colonial
powers had abandoned and all the world had condemned.
During these last thirty years the people of Acheh,
Sumatra, have witnessed how our fatherland has been
exploited and driven into ruinous conditions by the
Javanese neo-colonialists: they have stolen our
properties; they have robbed us from our livelihood;
they have abused the education of our children; they
have exiled our leaders; they have put our people in
chains of tyranny, poverty, and neglect: the
life-expectancy of our people is 34 years and is
decreasing - compare this to the world's standard of 70
years and is increasing! While Acheh, Sumatra, has been
producing a revenue of over 15 billion US dollars
yearly for the Javanese neo-colonialists, which they
used totally for the benefit of Java and the
Javanese.
We, the people of Acheh, Sumatra, would have no quarrel
with the Javanese, if they had stayed in their own
country, and if they had not tried to lord it over us.
From no on, we intend to be the masters in our own
house: the only way life is worth living; to make our
own laws: as we see fit; to become the guarantor of our
own freedom and independence: for which we are capable;
to become equal with all the peoples of the world: as
our forefathers had always been. In short, to become
sovereign in our own fatherland!
Our cause is just! Our land is endowed by the Almighty
with plenty and bounty. We covet no foreign territory.
We intend to be a worthy contributor to human welfare
the world over. We extend the hands of friendship to
all peoples and to all governments from the four
corners of the earth.
In the name of the sovereign people of Acheh,
Sumatra
Tengku Hasan M.di Tiro
Chairman, National Liberation Front of Acheh,
Sumatra,
and Head of State.
Acheh, Sumatra, December 4, 1976
