On October 20, 1999 the parliament elected the Islamic scholar A. Wahid as president; Megawati Sukarnoputri became the vice-president. In the Cabinet of National Unity formed by Wahid on October 29, 1999, for the first time since the 1950s a civilian took up the post of Minister of Defense; However, the predecessor General Wiranto initially secured the influential position of Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security, which he (made responsible for the terror in East Timor) but in February 2000 under pressure from President Wahid had to give up. The critically ill President Wahid countered the increasing criticism of his administration (unsteady political style, hardly any progress in containing the ethnic-religious conflicts that were shaking the country) by handing over part of his powers to Vice-President Megawati Sukarnoputri and partially reshuffling the government. From February 2001, attempts by Parliament to initiate impeachment proceedings against the Wahid , who had meanwhile been accused of corruption, led to massive protests by his supporters. The People’s Consultative Assembly removed Wahid on July 23, 2001 and elected Megawati Sukarnoputri to the new president. At the beginning of August 2001, this ordered the establishment of a tribunal to prosecute atrocities by the security forces and militias in East Timor. V. a. in October 2001 violent protests by Islamist forces in Indonesia. On October 12, 2002, the Indonesian holiday island of Bali was bombed (202 people died, mostly Australians and foreigners), for which the radical Islamic organization Jamaa Islamiya was held responsible. On October 1, 2005, Bali was hit again by terrorist attacks (at least 22 dead).
After student unrest, the Consultative People’s Assembly passed several fundamental constitutional changes in August 2002, including: direct election of President and Vice President from 2004; At the same time, she voted for the abolition of the parliamentary seats reserved for the armed forces. In the parliamentary elections on April 5, 2004, the Golkar became the strongest political force, while President Megawati Sukarnoputri’s PDI-P suffered a significant loss of votes. The first direct election of the President (July 5, 2004) was won by ex-general S. B. Yudhoyono in the runoff elections, in which he ran against Megawati Sukarnoputri on September 20, 2004, with 60.88% of the votes (Yudhoyono took office on September 20, 2004). 10. 2004). Visit cachedhealth.com for southeast Asia overview.
Threats to the internal stability of Indonesia arose v. a. from the worsening ethnic-religious conflicts (especially the bloody clashes between Christians and Muslims on the Moluccas, the years of heavy riots on Borneo between the local Dayak and the immigrants from Madura, some of whom were expelled or fled under brutal circumstances in 2001, and the fighting between the Papuan and Javanese immigrants in Papua); In addition, struggles for secession in individual regions created hot spots. B. a unilateral declaration of independence by Irian Jayas, for which an autonomy law came into force with the change of name in Papua at the beginning of 2002 (2003 separation of the western part as Irian Jaya Barat). For Aceh , in which rebels of the »Free Aceh Movement« (GAM) had been fighting for independence since 1976 and which was particularly hard hit by the tsunami disaster on December 26, 2004, a peace agreement was reached in Helsinki in August 2005 (followed by disarmament the GAM and beginning of the partial withdrawal of government troops). In July 2006, the Jakarta Parliament passed an autonomy law for Aceh. The short visit of US President G. W. Bush, which was accompanied by massive security precautions on November 20, 2006 in Jakarta was overshadowed by numerous angry protests. The demonstrators accused the US of promoting international terrorism with the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. As a result of the crisis in the world financial system, part of the financial sector collapsed in 2008. In January of the same year, the former dictator Suharto died. He received a state funeral. In July 2008 the »Truth and Friendship Commission« established by Indonesia and East Timor presented its final report. Then there were serious human rights crimes of a systematic nature in the context of East Timor’s struggle for independence in 1999, especially on the part of the Indonesian army. Indonesia recognized the systematic nature of the crimes established by the President Yudhoyonos “regretted” the first time.
In the parliamentary elections on April 9, 2009, President Yudhoyono’s PD was the strongest party with 26.8% of the vote, followed by the Golkar party (14.5%), which recorded significant losses compared to 2004. In the presidential elections on July 8, 2009, Yudhoyono was re-elected according to the official final result with 60.8% of the votes in the first ballot. His second term as President began on October 20, 2009. Indonesia was hit several times in 2009/10 by attacks by fanatical Islamists, in which more than 100 people were killed. In September 2009, Noordin Mohammad from Malaysia became Top, alleged leader of a local al-Qaeda group, shot dead by security forces in Java. In 2011, a court sentenced radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir to 15 years in prison for inciting terrorism. In 2012, German Chancellor A. Merkel visited Indonesia to deepen cooperation between the two countries. After the elimination of fuel subsidies, national strikes took place at the end of October 2013.
Parliamentary elections were held on April 9, 2014, in which the PDI-P became the strongest political force ahead of the Golkar party. The PD of the outgoing President Yudhoyono suffered considerable losses. In the presidential election on 09/07/2014 of the Electoral Commission of 07/22/2014 could, according to J. Widodo , the candidate of the PDI-P of the vote against the former general and Gerindra candidates, with 53.15% Prabowo Subianto (* 1951) prevail , which received 46.85% of the vote. Subianto initially did not recognize the election result and tried in vain to challenge the election before the constitutional court. On October 20th, 2014 J. Widodo was sworn in as president.
Indonesia shows its foreign policy commitment through its participation in numerous UN peace missions (including Lebanon, Congo, South Sudan). The country’s economic and political weight is evident from its membership in the G20 forum.