Miswar, Banda Aceh – The tabloid Beudoh, which was closed by the Aceh emergency military command (PDMD) because it ran an lead article titled “Acehnese People Don’t Need Elections Under Martial Law”, the result of which being that Beudoh’s editor was ordered to report to the PDMD [and threatened if the tabloid did not change is editorial line].

After not being published for several months, two days ago Fpdra.com found that Beudoh was again being circulated among the Acehnese public, particularly in the provincial capital of Banda Aceh. Although its tabloid format had change to a magazine, its contents were still sharp and courageous in exposing the realities of the military’s crimes in Aceh.

When contacted by e-mail, Beudoh’s editor Maarif said that the change of format from a tabloid to a magazine was only to in order to find a new format which was easy to circulate illegally, because we will not be circulating it openly any more. But the contents and commitment to the little people will continue to be Beudo’s the distinctive character.

So far we hove only publicized the first edition in magazine format with a print run of 6,000 copies, but in the future we will print more because there were a number of areas which asked for an aditional copies because of its popularity in places such as Lhokseumawe and Banda Aceh said Maarif.

A trader from a market in Aceh who did not want to give their name said that Beudoh’s reappearance represented a new spirit for the Acehnese people. Hopefully this will be the start of a reemergence of resistance by the Acehnese people against the military’s crimes since martial law came into force.

[Translated by James Balowski.]