Another Indonesian asylum seeker in the US, Mawar – not her real name – said she sought protection over an incident linked to her previous job at a travel agency, but declined to provide further details.
“I decided to apply for asylum in 2024,” said Mawar, 38, who previously lived in Jakarta and now works at a warehouse in Pennsylvania.
Harun, however, said many asylum claims by Indonesians fall short of the legal standard because they are based on personal disputes or discrimination, rather than state persecution or persecution carried out with the state’s acquiescence.
“Many asylum claims are weak if they’re based solely on personal discrimination. There has to be evidence that the government discriminated against a minority group, not simply hostility between individuals,” Harun said.
Harun said present-day Indonesia bears little resemblance to 1998, when the Asian financial crisis and political turmoil that culminated in the fall of longtime president Suharto drove many Indonesians to seek refuge overseas.
“After the 1998 riots, many Chinese Indonesians sought asylum in the US. Some were accepted, many were rejected,” said Shamsi Ali, who had already been living in the US before the May 1998 riots.
Shinta agreed that many of today’s asylum claims are exaggerated.
“If the claim is based on being LGBT, it may be understandable because Indonesia does not provide specific legal protections for that community. But claims based on persecution, riots or violence – from what I’ve seen – are often fabricated,” she said.
“These applicants come from places that are perfectly safe. They’ve never experienced any of those things.”
Akbar Kurnia Putra, an international law expert at the University of Jambi, said false asylum claims could lead to immediate deportation, adding that economic hardship alone is not grounds for asylum.
“People who move to another country solely in search of a better life or better job opportunities – economic migrants – do not qualify for refugee status or asylum,” he said.
