Constitutional Court Decision 263/PUU-XXIV/2026 is a 2026 ruling of the Constitutional Court of Indonesia on a petition for material review of Pasal 18(2) of Undang-Undang 37/1999 on foreign relations, the provision requiring the protection the government gives to Indonesian citizens and legal entities in legal disputes with foreign diplomatic missions in Indonesia to be given in accordance with the rules of international law and custom.^[1][2] The petition was brought by an individual citizen, a private-sector employee.^[3] It is one of the constitutional review cases decided by the Court on 12 August 2026.^[4]

The Court held that it had jurisdiction but did not reach the merits. It found that the grounds of the petition did not explain how the provision conflicted with the constitutional provisions invoked, and that the relief requested was framed in an unusual form, and declared the petition unclear (obscuur) and inadmissible.^[5][6][4:1]

¶ Background and petition

Pasal 18(1) of the Foreign Relations Law provides that the Government of Indonesia protects the interests of Indonesian citizens or legal entities that face legal problems with the representation of a foreign state in Indonesia, and Pasal 18(2) provides that this protection is given in accordance with the provisions of international law and custom (ketentuan hukum dan kebiasaan internasional).^[2:1]

The petition was received on 7 July 2026 and registered on 8 July 2026.^[3:1] It argued that the phrase "provisions of law and international custom" in Pasal 18(2) conflicted with the guarantee of legal certainty and equal treatment in Pasal 28D(1) of the 1945 Constitution and with the duty to respect the rights of others in Pasal 28J(1).^[5:1] Its account of the petitioner's injury drew on a personal dispute over an employment arrangement abroad and on earlier civil litigation in the Central Jakarta District Court.^[7] The relief sought a declaration that the phrase was conditionally unconstitutional unless read as "general legal provisions" (ketentuan hukum umum), and an order that the decision be published in the Berita Negara, citing the State Gazette number of 1999 in which the law had appeared.^[6:1]

¶ Procedure

The Court heard the petition at a preliminary examination on 20 July 2026 and, under Pasal 39 of the Constitutional Court Law and Pasal 36(3) of Peraturan Mahkamah Konstitusi 7/2025, advised the petitioner to repair the statement of jurisdiction, standing, grounds and relief, allowing until 3 August 2026 for a revision. The petitioner filed a revision received on 27 July 2026, a second by e-mail the same morning and a third on 28 July 2026. Because Pasal 37(3) of Peraturan MK 7/2025 permits a petition to be revised only once within the time allowed, the Court considered only the first revision.^[8]

¶ Ruling

The Court accepted that the petition was arranged in the required structure of jurisdiction, standing, grounds (posita) and relief (petitum), but held that formal sufficiency also turns on the substance of each part.^[9] It found that the grounds did not set out clearly and adequately the conflict between Pasal 18(2) and Pasal 28D(1) and 28J(1), dealing instead with the presentation of electronic evidence, a court judgment the petitioner had not been given and principles of conflict of laws, and that the "general legal provisions" reading requested was not explained in scope or content.^[5:2]

On the relief, the Court observed that the petition omitted the State Gazette references and the full formula "has no binding legal force", that granting it as framed would damage the construction of Pasal 18(2), and that the request to publish the decision in the Berita Negara under the 1999 gazette number was not intelligible. Both requests were held unusual in statutory review.^[6:2] On those grounds the petition was declared unclear and not considered further.

The operative order declared the petition inadmissible. The decision was reached by nine justices on 4 August 2026 and pronounced in open plenary session on 12 August 2026, with Suhartoyo presiding and the petitioner present.^[4:2] The same session disposed of decision 264/PUU-XXIV/2026 on the special hajj quota on the same ground of vagueness.^[10] Two weeks earlier, on 30 July 2026, the Court had declared inadmissible as unclear the petitions in decision 260/PUU-XXIV/2026 on the ITE Law and decision 261/PUU-XXIV/2026 on the Village Law.^[11]

CRPG's regulatory tracker published an account of the decision on 6 September 2026.^[12]

¶ See also

• Constitutional Court Decision 261/PUU-XXIV/2026
• Constitutional Court Decision 270/PUU-XXIV/2026

¶ External links

• Decision (Mahkamah Konstitusi)
• Case record (Mahkamah Konstitusi)
• CRPG: Constitutional Review of an International Custom Clause: MK 263/PUU-XXIV/2026 (crpg.id, 6 September 2026)

¶ References