What is world peace?

What is world peace? Different people have their own perspective in the definition of world peace. Some of the people said that world peace will exist when there is no war, no military forces, no conflict in between state and non-state country.

World peace is an ideal concept of happiness, freedom, and peace within all people and states. World peace is a concept of a world without violence, where states of the country try to cooperate with others. In Nelson Mandela’s autobiography Long Walk to Freedom, published in 1994 has stated that “If you want to make peace with your enemy, you have to work with your enemy. Then he becomes your partner’. That means if you want to avoid the war appearance and affect the world peace, you have to cooperate with your neighbour of state. So how will peace presence in this world? In 1963, John Kennedy speech, he has said that ‘Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures.’ Peace means that people can resolve conflicts without violence and get to improve their quality of lives. Peace existence when everyone lives in safety, without conflict, without fear or threat of violence. Everyone has fair in human rights, getting the education in free, availability of medicine and others.

World peace will also be affected by the terrorist in any state and non-state.

Terrorism is the systematic use of violence either is directly or indirectly to create a common atmosphere of fear in a population and to achieve an objective of a particular political. Terrorism involves the use or threat of violence and try to create fear among a wide audience not just within the direct victims. Terrorism thinks that they are weak, and they cannot achieve their goals through the legal way. In that case, they use the threat of violence to seek economic, religious, political or ideological goals.

The war is not only described as armed conflict, but it also admitted as a legal confirmation of the reality. The aim of the war is to destroy the properties, kill the members of the enemy and remove the ability of the enemy. War involved less people and those people will be professional and would not cause more death.

Two of the words “terrorism” and “war” have different meaning and it also will lead people to different desire. Both of them involved in extreme violence and motivated by political. In a county, war is a reasonable political for a country.

Sometimes, they got rules for war such as the treatment of civilians. There are no rules in war but in an international aspect, it has rules. War usually used for denying the sources from the enemy and make them surrender, it also saves lives from both sides.

For terrorism, they used to attack the nation and make them react and make more terrorism. Terrorism is also a recruitment strategy to make the conflict to be worsen. It might cause more conflict from both countries and the civilians will participate too.

The Changes in Sabah’s sovereignty Based on the history, Sabah was part of the territory of Brunei. In the 1760s, the Sultan of Brunei requested the Sulu State in the southern Philippines to help suppress the domestic uprising. Afterwards, some of the current Sabah land was ceded to Sulu as a reward. Since then, Sulu Sultan has claimed to have sovereignty over Sabah.

In 1878, the Sultan of Sulu signed an agreement with British North Borneo Co., which pays for Sabah annually. However, depending on the language of the signatory, there are many versions of the contract. Since the original English version of the agreement has been lost, whether the land is “cession” or “rented” becomes a mystery.

At the end of the 19th century, Sulu was incorporated into the Philippine territory. The Philippines insists that the agreement between Sulu Sultan and the British North Borneo Co. is a “rental” agreement, not a “cession” agreement, and Sabah’s sovereignty should be owned by the Philippines. The United Kingdom, according to the Malay text of the agreement, concluded that Sabah was “cession” rather than “rented”. In 1962, the ninth President of the Philippines Diosdado Macapagal formally proposed the sovereignty of Sabah based on the claims of the heirs of the Sultan of Sulu. However, Malaysia naturally inherits the British view and believes that Sabah is ‘cession’. In August 1963, before Malaya changed its name to Malaysia, UN Secretary-

General U Thant has sent an eight-person team to Sabah and Sarawak to investigate. It was concluded that the participation of Sabah and Sarawak in Malaysia is in line with the principles of the United Nations and in line with the wishes of the people of the two places mentioned above. On September 16, 1963, Malaysia was established and Sabah officially became a state of Malay West.

The Philippine government is very upset about Malaysia’s move, then refuses to recognize Malaysia, and called back the ambassador to the United States of Malaya.

After the establishment of the Malaysian government, it continues to pay the “transfer fee” to Sulu’s heirs every year. Based on this, the Sulu Sultan claims to still have Sabah’s sovereignty. However, Malaysia considers this amount as a transfer, but Sulu considers this amount to be a rental.

In 1965, the Philippines recognized Malaysia but “reserved the right to make a request to Sabah in the future”. The Philippines requested that the issue of Sabah be submitted to the International Court of Justice, but it was rejected by Malaysia.

In September 1968, the Philippine Congress passed a bill declaring that Sabah was the territory of the Philippines, and the two countries thus severed diplomatic relations. In December of the following year, the two countries announced the resumption of diplomatic relations, but the shadow of the Sabah issue still hangs over the relationship between the two countries. Since then, the Philippines has refused to give up its territorial claims to Sabah.

The successor of Macapagal, Ferdinand Marcos, continues to uphold the Philippines’ sovereignty over Sabah. In 1968, he even trained a team in Corregidor to prepare for infiltration into Sabah for sabotage. Although Marcos later gave up this request, the Malaysians wanted a more explicit statement that the Philippines publicly renounced the sovereignty of Sabah.

On January 19, 1986, the Philippine Senate proposed the determination of the non-Russian archipelago’s baseline motion. The main content of the Philippine Senate is that the Philippines can conditionally abandon its sovereignty requirements against Sabah, so that the long-standing Sabah territorial dispute between the Philippines and Malaysia has appeared. Since Maria Corazon Sumulong Cojuanco came to power in 1986, the Philippines offered to negotiate with Malaysia to resolve the issue of Sabah.

In February 1987, the Philippines passed the new constitution and deleted the old constitution about Sabah. In August of the same year, Vice President of the Philippines was invited to visit Malaysia, saying that the Philippines will take measures to abandon its territorial claims against Sabah. The third ASEAN summit will be held in the Philippines. The Philippine government accelerated the steps to resolve the Sabah issue, and the Philippine Parliament quickly passed a bill on abandoning the sovereignty of Sabah.

However, the Philippines is not unconditionally giving up its territorial claims to Sabah. According to reports, the exchange conditions proposed by the Philippines include: Philippine and Malaysia signed a treaty of good-neighborliness and border patrol; Malaysia no longer uses Sabah as a support for the Moro National Liberation Front of the Muslim organization in the southern Philippines; Malaysia should properly handle the influx Hundreds of thousands of Philippine ‘illegal immigrants’ in Sabah; continue to compensate the descendants of Sulu Sultan; give the priority to Philippine investment in Sabah.

In 1988, the Philippines announced that it would abandon its sovereignty over Sabah. The dispute between the two sides was calmed down, but the Sulu Sultan descendants insisted on their sovereignty in Sabah. And until today, the Malaysian government still pays RM5,000 (about $1,600) a year to Sulu Sultan. For many years that followed, the Philippines never formally proposed a sovereign claim against Sabah. Manila has also not issued any statement to withdraw its claim to Sabah.

The origin between Sulu Sultanate and Sabah.

The Sulu Sultanate is an ancient country established in the 15th century. It was more than 400 years ago and does not exist now. However, based on the history, it is still present in the southern part of the Philippines today. In 1658, in order to thank Sulu Sultan for helping to quell the rebellion, Brunei Sultan ceded the northeastern land of Sabah as a gift to Sulu Sultan.

In the 16th century, Sulu Islands were invaded by the Spaniards and the Sultanate Sultan was destroyed. In 1889, the war started between the United States and Spain. But Spain was defeated and forced to sign an armistice agreement with the United States. Then, Spain needs to retreat from South America and the Pacific Ocean, and Sulu Islands were thus assigned to United States. After the Second World War, Philippines was independence and Sulu Islands were also under the control of Philippines.

In 1878, Sulu Sultan rented out Sabah to British colonial as a basis for commercial trade. But in fact, the British wanted to get full control of Sabah. But the requirement is to provide weapons to Sulu Sultan in order to fight with Spanish invasion.

However, Sulu Sultan was still destroyed by Spain and became part of the Philippine colony under Spanish rule. In 1885, the British recognized Spain’s dominion over the Sulu Island and exchanged with Spain to abandon the dominion of North Borneo (including Sabah). Then in 1888, North Borneo has become the place that lives under the protection of British. Sabah has held a referendum that was led under United Nations in 1963. This resulted that Malaya had merged with Sabah and Sarawak became Malaysia. After Sabah was incorporated into Malaysia, Malaysian government still remain under British colonial practices and pays a nominal rent to Sulu’s descendants every year.

Lahad Datu

Based on the incident of Sulu army invasion Sabah Lahad Datu in 2013, it was started on 11 February and fully ended on 24 March 2013. The people who call Jamaru Kelan III are self-proclaimed he are Sulu and the Sultan of the Northern Borneo Kingdom had ordered the dispatch of the Sulu Army out of levy claiming to regain the sovereignty of Sabah. There are about 200 armed soldiers belonging to the Royal Army of the Sulu dynasty of the Philippines had occupied part of the land of Naha, Sabah and declared the area with the name of Sulu Sultan Jamalukilan III and wanted to have sovereignty of the area. They also took along the powerful firearms such as machine guns and grenades to invade to Lahad Datu. So that, those Sulu army are considered by local residents as a terrorist. Not only that, the Sulu army is hold aloft their own Sovereign flag of Sulu Sultanate and not because of Jihad or Islamic State because they think that Sabah is under Sulu Sultan territory and Malaysia is just paying RM5300 every year to the rent of Sabah from Sulu Dynasty.

Therefore, the purpose of the Sulu Army to dispatch soldiers in Sabah Lahad Datu is to ask the Malaysia’s government to pay higher rents to them, but the Putrajaya government refused and asked the Sulu army to retreat the army from Sabah but the Sulu army claimed that Sabah was owned by Sultanate of Sulu so they did not violate any laws and also had the rights to defend themselves. Even though the Malaysia police forces has repeatedly tried to negotiate with the Sulu Army to get best solution, but the Sulu army still refuse to leave peacefully even though the deadline was expired but negotiations are still in progress. In March 1, Malaysia police dropped the flyer from the helicopter to command the militants to surrender but the militants fired at the police and two polices died and three were injured. After that, the police are having shootout with the militants and 12 people from the militant’s group were annihilated.

The next day, Philippine President Aquino III demanded that Sulu armed men hiding in Nayong immediately surrendered unconditionally. Moreover, the Malaysia’s police had received an information about the militants invaded Sabah Semporna and sent a team of police officers to investigate but unfortunately in this action 6 polices had died and two were injured and six enemy died and one of them trying to hold on to the villagers as hostages but killed by the villagers. Furthermore, some of the polices who were injured is successfully saved but the others were been cruelly decomposited by the militants. The Malaysian and Philippines Foreign Minister were having a meeting in Kuala Lumpur and tag intruder as terrorist.

In March 5, our former prime minister Datuk Sri Najib announced Royal Malaysian Police had expanded a sovereign action and try to end the conflict with Sulu army and it was to defend the right of dignity and the lord of the country. Not only that,

Royal Malaysian Police such as police, navy, army and air force attack the terrorists in Kampong Tanduo (Lahad Datu) and carried out raids and searched operations to retrieve the sovereignty and protection of the area in the area. Moreover, the preservation situation is fully controlled.

Not only that, based on this case standoff also known as Lahad Datu incursion, a painful memory in 2013, Jamalul ibni Punjungan Kiram III, Sultan of the Sulu Sultanate as the foreigner has been arrested, involved and labelled as terrorist in Malaysia. This is because of the invasion of Lahad Datu, Sabah that Sulu armies has causes fear in between Malaysian and foreign country people, Malaysian had the fear because of the behavior of Sulu armies is cruel. The Lahad Datu standoff also created death, there is a total of 68 deaths, nine from the Malaysian authorities and six civilians, and 56 from the Sulu sultanate. It also appears military conflict when the case happened. The Sabah Security Council of Malaysia issued a statement that Sulu Army as terrorists on 11 March 2013.

How the government take action to Sulu (detail)?

On February 12, 2013, hundreds of Sulu Army sneaked into the area of East Malaysia which is Sabah and Semporna, demanded Sabah’s sovereignty from Malaysia and clashed with the Malaysian military and police. After three weeks of gunfire confrontation, ‘Sulu Sultan’ Jamalul Kiram III announced that he will unilaterally stop the war in Sabah; a total of 62 Sulu military were killed, while also 10 of the Malaysian security forces were unfortunately killed.

However, Jamalul Kiram III also died on October 20 of the same year, at the age of 75. But Sulu Sultanance did not end at this year, and the royal family’s member relatives began to fight for the power of ‘Sulu Sultan’ and continued to threaten the eastern part of Sabah. 

When the Sulu Army invasion broke out, the 6th Prime Minister of Malaysia who is Dato’ Sri Haji Mohammad Najib bin Tun Haji Abdul Razak make an announcement on March 7, 2013 that the five districts on the eastern part of Sabah which is Lahad Datu, Kudat, Tawau, Guna and Sandakan would be listed as the Eastern Sabah Security Command (ESSCOM) to ensure that Sabah’s sovereignty is no longer infringed.

On March 25, Dato’ Sri Haji Mohammad Najib announced the establishment of the ‘ Eastern Sabah Security Zone ‘ (ESSZONE), covering 10 counties in eastern Sabah to strengthen security in eastern Sabah.

However, the establishment of a number of measures did not solve the security problem in Sabah. During the period from 2015 to 2015, there were many kidnappings or abductions in eastern Sabah. From Malaysians to foreign tourists, they were taken away by armed elements in the Philippines, and request ransom.

Temporary peace: the risk of renewed Sabah problem

Although the armed conflict in Sabah has already come to a paragraph, the Philippines has reported that more Sulu supporters are going to Sabah to participate in the war. And the Philippine official also relied on the ‘old incidents’ of the armed conflict in Sabah. In Philippine News Agency, in February 2018, the Philippine Foreign Ministry reported that the Philippine authorities did not completely abandon Sabah.

According to the report, the Philippine authorities temporarily put this singer on the shelf because of the bilateral relationship between the Philippines and Malaysia. On the same day, the deputy spokesperson of the Philippine President said that according to her understanding, the voice was still there, but it has not been promoted for quite a long time. It is still too early to completely end the ‘confrontation incident’ in Sabah.

Although the Sabah territorial dispute is not a direct conflict between the Philippines and the Malaysian government, but it also reflects from the side that there are still many territorial disputes between ASEAN members. In addition to the Philippines and Malaysia, territorial disputes exist in the Philippines and Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia, Singapore and Malaysia.

Liberalism Theory Applied in a case

Liberalism is one of the theories of International Relations, this theory is more focus on freedom and communication. This theory also focuses in democracy and cooperation between each state and non-state. Liberalism is an international political theory that believes the basic force in world politics is globalization. Globalization is the interdependence between the groups’ interests in different societies. These groups then go to their government and ask them to manage their country in different ways, and then the demands of non-state groups from different societies have led the governments to act in different ways. Thus, this has led to a world system in which countries have different national preferences for the ultimate outcome of international politics. The test of a good theory is whether or not it generates particular mid-range claims at the level of things like that are relatively simple and relatively powerful. Based on this criterion, liberalism theory is a powerful and relatively simple theory. The uniqueness of liberal theory is that it can explain the wide variations in the results we actually see in the international system. Therefore, liberalism is extremely powerful in explaining the results of cooperation in the international system because it can predict the conditions under which countries have integrated interests. It can also explain the democratic peace phenomenon between democracies that tend to cooperate with each other rather than go to war with each other.

We had applied this theory inside the case of Lahad Datu is because it contained the concept of cooperation that mention in Liberalism. First evidence that we found in this case is Malaysia try to contain and mitigate the violent power of Sulu Sultanate.

Malaysia had given 3 opportunity to Sulu Sultanate to retreat and not to attack Sabah by using negotiation. Sulu Sultanate is a non-state group under Philippines. This case has affected the reputation of Philippines. So, Philippines has chosen to cooperate with Malaysia to ask Sulu Sultanate army to retreat. On 12 February until 28 February 2013, Malaysia asked Sulu Sultanate to retreat. In the same time, Philippines also gave out the memo to ask them to stand out for this case. Why Philippines didn’t choose to help Sulu Sultanate to attack Malaysia? This is because if Philippines help the Sulu Sultanate to attack Malaysia, it might cause big conflict and war. Once the war begins, it will not lead to world peace and every nation will suffer in this world. Therefore, the diplomacy of the Philippines and Malaysia declared that Sulu Sultanate is “Terrorism” at 4 March This evidence has been proved by the citations that stated by Ronald Reagan which is peace is not the absence of conflict, it is the ability to handle conflict by peaceful means.

Conclusion

In conclusion, our group did not agree that terrorism will affect world peace. It is because based on the theory liberalism, if both of the countries have good communication and cooperation, it can lead to world peace. When power of them combine together, it will solve conflict and make less issue. As we were given the example which between Philippine and Malaysia in settle down the case of Sulu Sultanate. In this case, it was proven that the war won’t bring to the world peace but bring the world to a worse situation. Such as the core nation will sneak into the country that is rioting.