A peace built on death
'There is no other way to put this. Peace and this election are the direct consequences of the death of our 178,000 brothers who perished in the tsunami,' said Bakhtiar Abdullah, one of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) historic leaders, who recently returned to Aceh after 25 years in exile. 'It was the tsunami that opened Aceh to the world and brought the international spotlight here. Before, we were a forgotten war.'
The Helsinki peace agreement followed intense international pressure on both Jakarta and GAM to concentrate on reconstruction of the province, the worst hit by the natural disaster.
Under such circumstances, it took only five meetings over a few days for the two sides to agree on a substantial autonomy to replace the call for independence.
It was a call that, intermittently, had been heard in Aceh since 1947, when, disappointed with its diluted autonomy, the Acehnese declared themselves part of the Darul Islam, a movement born in Central Java and aimed at establishing a separate Indonesian Islamic state.
However, the latest stage of the conflict started in 1976, when Hasan di Tiro, described by Mr Bakhtiar as 'one of the greatest leaders ever', established GAM, a secular rebel group. On October 30, 1976, Tiro declared Aceh independent and war started anew.
In the 30-year conflict, several peace pacts were signed and quickly forgotten ... while 15,000 people, mostly civilians, died.
Then came the tsunami. The talks, the peace and now the election: 'It is like a dream, but a dream that took too many lives to come true,' said Mr Bakhtiar, sniffing the strong aroma of the renowned Arabica Acehnese coffee in his office on the outskirts of the province capital, Banda Aceh.