THE RESPONSIBILITY IN PROTECTING THE ROHINGYA REFUGEES IN ACEH PROVINCE, INDONESIA: AN INTERNATIONAL REFUGEES LAW PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

The coast of western Indonesia (Aceh province) has been the entrance for Rohingya refugees since 2012. At the beginning of 2020, the Rohingya refugees continued to arrive, although some of them have been resettled and transferred to the third countries. The Indonesian government rejected a large number of Rohingya refugees because there were no lex specialis in the Indonesian immigration arrangement related to asylum seekers and refugees. Historically, Indonesia was a country with commitment and experiences in dealing with refugees, however to date, Indonesia refused to become a party to the 1951 International Refugee Convention and 1967 Protocol on Refugees. Hence, there is no legal standards of the refugee management in Indonesia, and thus it complicates the management of the incoming Rohingyas. Responding to such issue, the government has issued the Presidential Regulation Number 125 of 2016 concerning the foreign refugee management to provide a temporary legal standard for all forms of refugee protection in Indonesia. However, such regulation has yet to comprehensively settled the management of the Rohingya people in Indonesia, particularly in Aceh province. This paper strongly advocates the Indonesian government to ratify the 1951 International Refugee Convention as to protect and settle the refugee under the non-refoulment principle which is fundamentally referred to humanitarian values.