Word: jakarta
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Autonomy is Indonesia's big hope these days. In the center of Sampit, it's extolled on a giant billboard urging locals to support officials who assume power under the new scheme. With the autonomy program, much of Jakarta's former power over finance and administration has been passed down to some 360 regencies?what would be called counties in other countries?and municipalities. It's a radical shift in the way Indonesia is governed, decided upon in direct response to restive populations in Aceh, Irian Jaya and Riau. The autonomy program, however, also encourages resentments and jealousies...
...Rather than preserving Indonesia's unity, the effect of the new laws may be widespread social splintering of the sort described in Sampit. According to Hans Vriens, who heads the Jakarta office of the Washington-based consultants Apco, which has completed a study of the autonomy program, the hastily implemented new system will leave a few resource-rich areas better off. But much of the rest of Indonesia will suffer from a precipitous drop in income. The result: economic chaos that could engender "a widespread breakdown in law and order," as well as an intensification of existing conflicts...
...their gray and chocolate-colored uniforms, they resemble private security guards more than crack troops, something they are painfully conscious of, especially when they meet up with the real army. And when the trucks finally arrived at the gates of the port 3 km away, they encountered soldiers from Jakarta's elite Kostrad rapid deployment unit, recognizable by their smart green berets and camouflage uniforms...
...numbers of users or addicts. Asia has some of the toughest drug laws in the world. In Thailand, China, Taiwan and Indonesia, even a low-level drug trafficking or dealing conviction can mean a death sentence. Yet yaba is openly sold in Thailand's slums and proffered in Jakarta's nightclubs, and China's meth production continues to boom. Even Japan, renowned for its strict anti-drug policies, has had virtually no success in stemming speed use and abuse. "The drug situation is so serious right now that the Prime Minister himself is heading the anti-drug task force," says...
Picking the photojournalist for this project was easy: Jim Nachtwey has shot wars and famines and revolutions for TIME since 1984. When I called him last week to congratulate him on his photos, he was on assignment in Jakarta. He faxed his thoughts about what this story meant to him, and I'd like to share with you what he wrote...