US embassy cable - 05HELSINKI185

S E C R E T HELSINKI 000185 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
STATE FOR EAP/IET, INR/EAP, AND EUR/NB 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/11/2015 
TAGS: PREL, PGOV, PHUM, MOPS, ID, FI, EAIDS, Aceh Talks 
SUBJECT: ACEH: FINNISH INTERMEDIARY MORE PESSIMISTIC ABOUT 
PROSPECTS FOR HELSINKI TALKS 
 
REF: STOCKHOLM 00246 (NOTAL) 
 
Classified By: POLOFF DAVID ALLEN SCHLAEFER FOR REASONS 1.4 (B AND D) 
 
 1.  (S)  DCM Weisberg met with Juha Christensen on February 
11 to discuss the Aceh talks in Helsinki.  Christensen is the 
Finnish businessman who facilitated the introduction of 
former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari as a mediator 
between the GoI and GAM.  Christensen was decidedly more 
pessimistic about the prospects for successful negotiations 
than he was when the DCM spoke with him last week. 
Christensen said that he believed there was only a 50-50 
chance that the GAM leadership in Stockholm would agree to 
participate in a second round of talks in Helsinki 
(tentatively proposed for February 24).  He attributed this 
to the dissatisfaction of GAM field commanders with the 
Stockholm group's handling of the first round of talks;  in 
particular, Christensen said that the GAM field commander in 
Thailand was unhappy with the talks and believed the GAM's 
Stockholm leadership was "selling out" to the GoI by 
suggesting a negotiated settlement short of independence was 
acceptable.  Christensen said that this negative feedback 
from the field was responsible for the public criticism of 
Ahtisaari (i.e., that he had pressured the GAM too much on 
the GoI's behalf) and the hardening of the GAM's position 
over the past few days. 
 
2.  (S)  Christensen opined to Weisberg that the Tokyo talks 
several years ago had broken down because of GAM insistence 
on independence as the sine qua non of any comprehensive 
settlement, and that he feared this might happen again.  He 
said that the GAM leaders "just don't get it" as regards the 
lack of international support for Acehnese independence, and 
that Ahtisaari's frank advice that they should give up their 
insistence on independence and use the negotiations to get as 
much as possible out of a "special autonomy" status appeared 
to have upset some of them.  When the DCM asked Christensen 
if there was any disagreement among the GAM leaders in 
Stockholm about how to proceed, Christensen replied that 
"Prime Minister" Malik Mahmud was the "most approachable" and 
seemed to have the most realistic expectations about the GAM 
could achieve;  others, however, were more influenced by the 
views of the field commanders that a harder line should be 
maintained on independence. 
 
3.  (S)  Christensen also told Weisberg that two 
representatives from the Henri Dunant Center in Switzerland 
(Mark Griffiths and Tom Korman) had visited the GAM leaders 
in Stockholm on February 10 to urge them to accept 
Ahtisaari's proposal for a second round of talks. 
Christensen said that if the GAM leaders "will listen to 
anyone, it will be the Henri Dunant (representatives)." 
Christensen went on to say that he understood a meeting had 
occurred at Indonesian Vice President Kalla's home on 
February 10 to discuss the GoI's strategy for the next round 
of talks;  however, he did not provide any further details of 
this meeting. 
 
4.  (S)  Finally, Christensen told the DCM that his 
(Christensen's) impression was that if a referendum on 
special autonomy was held in Aceh, 70-85% of Acehnese would 
support the concept as a permanent solution to the situation. 
 Christensen used this assertion to illustrate how out of 
touch he believed the GAM's leaders and field commanders to 
be with actual popular sentiment in Aceh, especially in the 
wake of the tsunami.  Christensen said that after many years 
of living and working in the region, the impression he got 
from most Aceh residents was that they couldn't voice their 
opinion about autonomy; if they voiced support for 
independence, the TNI