Indonesia and Malaysia prepare for top-level talks

KUALA LUMPUR: Senior Malaysian and Indonesian officers met in the run-up to the annual talks on Oct 20 between Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

The two-hour meeting yesterday of the 11th Joint Commission for Bilateral Cooperation between Malaysia and Indonesia (JCBC) was jointly headed by Malaysian Foreign Ministry Deputy Secretary-General Datuk Husni Zai Yaacob and Indonesian Foreign Ministry's Asia Pacific and Africa Director-General T.M. Hamzah Tayeb.

The ministerial level meeting today will be headed by Foreign Minister Datuk Seri Anifah Aman and his counterpart Dr R.M. Marty M. Natalegawa.

Husni said the meeting discussed follow-up actions to the outcome of discussions of the annual talk between Najib and Susilo last year.

“We also discussed the status of 15 memoranda of understanding (MoU) which were signed by both nations and other issues like domestic workers and preparation for the annual meeting to be carried out in Lombok,” he told reporters after the meeting.

In the May 18, 2010 talks in Putrajaya, Najib and Susilo agreed to boost efforts to realise strategic aspirations and common interests including through the Joint Commission Meeting (JCM) mechanism.

The strategic aspirations included those on economic issues; to ensure the rights of Malaysian employers and Indonesian maids were protected through an MoU on the recruitment and placement of Indonesian maids as well as increasing air links.

Asked on the proposed direct hiring of domestic workers, Hamzah said the joint commission had already submitted the report to the ministerial level for further deliberation.