Indonesia's ambassador to Bucharest, Meidyatama Suryodiningrat, said Jakarta condemned the unilateral use of force and the violation of Ukraine's territorial integrity, voted for the United Nations resolution condemning the attack, and tried to mediate. He said the effort failed.
He said then-president Joko Widodo was the first Asian leader, and the second leader from outside the European Union after Canada's Justin Trudeau, to visit Kyiv, and in 2022 was the second leader after the Austrian chancellor to travel between Kyiv and Moscow. In 2023 Indonesia's defence minister, who is now president, presented a ceasefire proposal at the Shangri-La Dialogue. Suryodiningrat said it was not accepted. He grounded the position in Article 2 of the UN Charter, which bars the unilateral use of force, and Chapter VI, which requires peaceful settlement.
He said peace talks failed at that stage because nobody was ready. He cited a Swiss initiative early the previous year, other efforts, and a latest attempt by the United States. Whether the parties are ready now, he said, depends on the United States, the European Union and Russia. He described Ukraine's position as clear: recovery of all its territory. The open questions, he said, are how long Washington and the EU will keep financing and supporting the Ukrainian army, and how long Russia will have the energy to continue.
Suryodiningrat described relations with Russia as good and said Indonesia keeps diplomatic and commercial ties, as Romania and most of Europe do. He said Romania-Russia trade over the past two years was probably comparable to Indonesia-Romania trade four or five years earlier. On China, he called Beijing a neighbour, friend and Indonesia's largest partner, while noting competing territorial claims, and said he does not expect war between them. He said Indonesia follows an independent and active foreign policy, belongs to no military alliance and hosts no foreign military base, and quoted his president's line that a thousand friends are too few and one enemy is too many.
On the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said Indonesia's support for Palestine is based on the 1945 constitution and the 1955 Asia-Africa Conference, and on Security Council Resolution 242 covering Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. He said a two-state solution begins with recognition of Palestine, and that his president has said the same at the United Nations. He argued that Romania should feel empathy because of its own history under the Habsburg, Russian and other empires. He said the United Nations is still needed and should be reformed, above all through broader geographic representation on the Security Council. On tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, he called the situation a conflict, said Indonesia opposes any unilateral use of force, and described Jakarta as a firm supporter of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
He also used the interview on the podcast Agenda Internațională to press the bilateral relationship. Romania and Indonesia have had diplomatic ties for 76 years, which he called excellent and free of major disputes, and therefore at risk of neglect despite about 10,000 kilometres between them. He urged closer cooperation in education and trade. Indonesia imports about 12 million tonnes of wheat a year, roughly Romania's entire annual output, yet Romanian wheat exports to Indonesia were zero for three decades until last year. He said the topside of Romania's Neptun Alpha platform for Neptun Deep was built in Karimun, Indonesia.
He described Romania's Black Sea position and its role as a gateway to the Balkans and Central and Eastern Europe as strategic, and said routing cargo through Constanța could cut transit by almost a week compared with Rotterdam, Hamburg or Bilbao. He said the constraint is infrastructure, including further work on corridors such as the Danube. As a full EU member with a heavy reliance on agriculture, he said, Romania can help align interests with partners outside the Union. He said Indonesia joined BRICS in 2025 as one more framework for dialogue and a Global South trade network, and that Jakarta has not advocated dedollarisation.
Suryodiningrat said Indonesians in Romania rose from about 300 when he arrived roughly three years ago to more than 1,200, mostly skilled workers in hospitality and some office jobs, and that they feel at home apart from the winter. His closing message was that distance should not separate the two countries and that both put international law and international institutions first in foreign policy.