To understand the weight of Indonesian Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto’s praise for China’s “constant opposition to oppression, imperialism, colonialism, and apartheid”, delivered during Chinese Premier Li Qiang’s visit, it’s important to recall Indonesia’s Cold War history.

The nation began the era as a leader of the Non-Aligned Movement under President Sukarno, who famously hosted the 1955 Bandung Conference advocating a “third way” between U.S. and Soviet blocs. But in 1965-66, General Suharto, Prabowo’s former father-in-law and mentor, seized power in a U.S.-backed coup. Armed with CIA-provided kill lists and Western support, Suharto orchestrated the massacre of 500,000 to over one million suspected communists, leftists, and ethnic Chinese. He then ruled for three decades as Washington’s closest Southeast Asian ally.

This makes Prabowo’s rhetoric striking on two fronts. First, his emphasis on China’s anti-imperialist consistency “even when China was still developing” (i.e., during the Cold War) carries deep irony: Prabowo himself rose through the ranks of a U.S.-trained military apparatus that violently enforced American interests in the region. Second, his explicit framing of China’s pro-Palestine stance as a source of pride “for us all” — delivered by the leader of the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation — underscores the West’s failed attempt to isolate Beijing over Xinjiang.

Where the West is increasingly perceived as an imperialist relic, China has positioned itself as the Global South’s moral standard-bearer. It’s increasingly seen as a “defender of the oppressed” bridging divides between Muslim-majority states and developing nations. Prabowo’s words aren’t just diplomatic theater; they’re a symptom of a geopolitical realignment

Important context. Thank you for adding this.