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In the Navy


This story is all very interesting for the real questions that it skirts around?

Specifically:
What does NAMRU actually do?
What is it researching into now?
Why a Navy research facility in Indonesia?
Why would scientists need diplomatic immunity when others who are part of the embassy community have none?

clipped from www.thejakartapost.com

U.S. insists on immunity for all Namru-2 laboratory staff


Abdul Khalik ,  The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Fri, 04/25/2008 12:27 AM  |  Headlines


The United States has insisted on diplomatic status for all 19 Americans at its Namru-2 research lab in Jakarta, while also maintaining the lab is committed to transparency.


Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy John A. Heffern said American researchers at the Naval Medical Research Unit No. 2 (Namru-2) had some level of diplomatic immunity as part of the embassy community.


“It is our hope in negotiations that an MOU would allow Americans at Namru to have (diplomatic) status,” he told a news conference here Thursday.


Indonesia said Wednesday it decided to grant diplomatic immunity to only two American officials at Namru-2 and demanded the laboratory ensure transparency in its operations.


Indonesia and the United States are now negotiating a new MOU to extend the operation of Namru-2 after the previous agreement expired in 2005.

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One response to “In the Navy”

  1. Achmad Sudarsono Avatar
    Achmad Sudarsono

    Halo My Friend,

    As a humble ukuele player, I don’t understand science, but informed birdies on the grape vine whisper the following:

    – NAMRU does alot of epidemiology. Alot of tropical disease work, and recently bird flu research.

    – They didn’t really push for diplomatic immunity until the current health minister started trying to kick a few key people out.

    – Some poo bahs in the Indonesian scientific community such as LIPI claim they’ve been shut out of the global scientific community.

    – In retort, some foreign scientists either based here or having visited here claim Indonesia’s scientific bureaucracy is dominated by lazy, incompetent, ass-kissers who got there through politics and not scientific competence. They also claim the system here weeds out dissident, creative, enterprising Indonesian scientists by replacing them with ass-kissers.

    – Indonesian science Bapaks dispute the criticism above. They also claim big Western Unis can be arrogant and pushy, using the excuse of scientific freedom to win special access for their own employees.

    These tensions came to a head in the dispute over access and credit for the findings of the “Hobbit” bones in Flores.

    Whilst Indonesians have a right to be sensitive about neo-colonialism in the world of knowledge and past cases of being shut out, why would LIPI and academia be different to other institutions ? Rima, an Indonesian at Indonesia Matters has made similar criticisms of DPR members on junkets abroad.

    All a tangled web of ethics, global justice vs scientific freedoms, vs, ongoing North-South tensions.

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