REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- Deputy chairman of Commission I of the House of Representatives Hanafi Rais said he supports plan to strengthen military base in the Natuna islands to protect the Indonesian sovereignty and to enforce law in the border region.
"Making Natuna a military base is our way of enforcing the law and at the same time to preserve our sovereignty," Hanafi said here on Wednesday.
In facing the Chinese transgression of Indonesian exclusive economic zone, the country needs to enforce international law, he said.
"In order to protect the country's sovereignty, Indonesia clearly has to negotiate with China," he added.
He said the Commission I already gave its agreement last year to a plan to build a complete military base in Natuna to be carried out by phases.
The first phase was to lengthen the Natuna airport runway starting last year, he said.
Another deputy chairman of Commission I TB Hasanudin said most important of all now is to seek peaceful solution to the South China Sea conflict.
However, as a sovereign country, Indonesia needs to have a deterrence with better preparations in facing conflict, he said.
"The deterrent effect is more effective from diplomatic point of view as we have no attacking capability, but we have the strength to defend in emergency," he said.
The call for strengthening military base in Natuna came following recent incident with Indonesian navy detaining a Chinese fishing boat with a number of crew members.
Last week, Indonesian warships challenged a group of Chinese fishing boats poaching within Indonesia's 200-mile exclusive economic zone off the Natuna Islands.
The Indonesian Navy fired warning shots to the air and to the sea when the fishing boats began to run away and refused to stop.
China protested and claimed a crewman was injured in the incident, but the Indonesian government denied saying no one was injured by the shots.
In March, a Chinese Coast Guard vessel forcibly recovered a fishing boat that had been seized by Indonesian maritime authorities near the Natuna Islands by ramming the boat. The boat's eight Chinese crew members, already on an Indonesian ship, were detained after being accused of fishing illegally.
In May, the Indonesian Navy fired warning shots at a Chinese fishing boat and detained its eight-person crew, also in the region of the Natuna Islands, on charge of fishing illegally.
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