December 17, 2009 Comments 6
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The shooting of one of West Papua's independence leaders, Kelly Kwalik, has opened up new opportunities for a negotiated resolution to that troubled territory's long-running problems. Kwalik was one of two senior commanders of the Free Papua Organisation's National Liberation Army (OPM/TPN), and had a reputation as being among the OPM hardliners.
However, despite recent Indonesian army claims, he was not behind a recent spate of shooting near the enormous Freeport gold and copper mine, a claim that was accepted by local police.
Kwalik's death came after an informer told another group of police that he was behind the shooting, and where he was hiding. In an attempt to arrest him, police shot Kwalik in the leg. However, he died in hospital, in circumstances that remain unclear.
Kwalik led the more militant of two groups of separatist fighters in West Papua and orchestrated a number of kidnappings and attacks in the 1980s and '90s. However, in recent years, Kwalik had joined with the West Papua National Coalition for Liberation, an umbrella organisation of pro-independence groups seeking a negotiated settlement to West Papua's issues, and had not been militarily active.
Kwalik denied involvement in the recent shootings near the Freeport mine, which have left three people dead and briefly closed the mine, as well as a deadly ambush on US teachers in 2002. Suspicion for these attacks has focused on a dispute between the Indonesian army (TNI) and the Indonesian national police (Polri) over the division of spoils for protecting the mine site, which is one of the largest in the world.
As Indonesia's Government has moved to gradually wind back the involvement of the TNI in domestic affairs, it has increasingly handed over to the police responsibility for internal security. However, as a lucrative source of corrupt income, the TNI has opposed this shift of responsibility, and has been at pains to establish a case that the police are unable to deal with security issues.
In classic protection racket-style, if a security problem does not exist, it is created. If the police are capable of looking after the situation, create a situation that is beyond their control.
Kwalik's death will have little material impact on West Papua's separatist movement, given his own relatively hard-line position and the movement's shift towards seeking a negotiated settlement. However, his death may indicate to many younger activists that the Indonesian Government's security forces remain too concerned with their own welfare to place trust in them.
However, the death of Kwalik, as a hardliner, may also allow the West Papua Coalition an opportunity to streamline its internal negotiating position. The question will be, in his second and final term of office, whether Indonesia's President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is serious about taking up the option of negotiation.
Professor Damien Kingsbury has been appointed to a personal chair in the School of International and Political Studies at Deakin University.
Source: theage.com.au
Friday 25 December 2009
West Papua: Dialogue Needed Between NZ and Jakarta
10:21 December 24, 2009Pacific Press Releases 0 comments
Press Release – Indonesia Human Rights Committee
The Indonesia Human Rights Committee is calling on Prime Minister John Key and Foreign Minister Murray McCully to support the calls for dialogue to avert further tension and violence in West Papua. Human Rights Committee,
23 December, 2009
Media Release: Call for NZ support for dialogue in the wake of death of West Papuan leader.
The Indonesia Human Rights Committee is calling on Prime Minister John Key and Foreign Minister Murray McCully to support the calls for dialogue to avert further tension and violence in West Papua. Since the death of resistance leader, Kelly Kwalik on December 16, the territory has experienced an outpouring of grief and anger within the Papuan community.
New Zealand has successfully promoted and supported dialogue for Bougainville and can now be a credible advocate for peace and dialogue again, but action needs to be taken urgently.
Rt Hon John Key,
Prime Minister,
Parliament Buildings,
Wellington
Hon Murray McCully,
Parliament Buildings,
Wellington
Dear Mr Key and Mr McCully,
The Indonesia Human Rights Committee is deeply concerned about the possibility of escalating conflict in West Papua in the wake of the death of OPM (Free West Papua Movement) leader, Kelly Kwalik. We believe that an internationally mediated dialogue between Papuan representatives and the Indonesian Government is now imperative.
We call on the New Zealand Government to publicly back negotiation and dialogue as the path to peace in West Papua.
Kelly Kwalik died after he was shot by the Police Mobile Brigade and the anti-terror force Detachment 88 on December 16. He is reported to have died after being taken to hospital but the circumstances of his death have not been made clear.
Since Kelly Kwalik’s death there has been an outpouring of grief and anger within the West Papuan community, including considerable tension around the funeral arrangements and burial site. Requests for the nationalist ‘Morning Star’ flag to be flown at the time of the funeral were turned down, but his coffin was defiantly draped in the flag. There have been pro-independence demonstrations and calls for the Freeport McMoran mine to be closed, by Papuan customary leaders. Kelly Kwalik and his people were dispossessed by the mine and many believe that Freeport was indirectly responsible for his death.
The Timika Catholic Bishop John Philip Saklil, who led the service, said that Kelly Kwalik was a patriot who had dedicated his life to the land of Papua. It is widely acknowledged that in recent years Kelly Kwalik had turned from armed struggle to the pursuit of dialogue with Indonesia and support for a Zone of Peace.
Despite some claims in the Indonesian media, we believe that it is not credible that that Kelly Kwalik was responsible for the lethal attacks in the Timika area in this year and in 2002. The deaths in 2002 of 3 teachers including 2 Americans, have been subject to independent human rights investigations which indicate that the military was involved in these attacks. Not long before his death, Kelly Kwalik met with security officials and denied that he had any involvement in this year’s attacks in the mine area. We understand that the police supported his claims, refuting earlier comments from the military of OPM involvement in the attacks.
We believe that the West Papuan people and the rest of the world want answers to questions relating to the method and reasons why Kelly Kwalik died. There are also unanswered questions about the fate of those arrested at the time of the shooting
of Kelly Kwalik, especially as one the five arrested was a ten year old boy.
But most importantly, we believe that West Papua’s Pacific neighbours, including New Zealand should now join the call for the Indonesian Government to respond to the demands of the West Papuan people for peaceful dialogue. There must be a just and open process to address deep grievances including the marginalisation of the indigenous people and decades of documented cases of police and military killings and brutality. West Papua also experiences desperate health circumstances, an epidemic of HIV/Aids and rampant deforestation and environmental destruction.
It is time for New Zealand, which successfully supported peaceful negotiations for another Melanesian territory, Bougainville, to take up the cause of peace and dialogue again.
Yours sincerely,
Maire Leadbeater
(for the Indonesia Human Rights Committee)
ENDS
Press Release – Indonesia Human Rights Committee
The Indonesia Human Rights Committee is calling on Prime Minister John Key and Foreign Minister Murray McCully to support the calls for dialogue to avert further tension and violence in West Papua. Human Rights Committee,
23 December, 2009
Media Release: Call for NZ support for dialogue in the wake of death of West Papuan leader.
The Indonesia Human Rights Committee is calling on Prime Minister John Key and Foreign Minister Murray McCully to support the calls for dialogue to avert further tension and violence in West Papua. Since the death of resistance leader, Kelly Kwalik on December 16, the territory has experienced an outpouring of grief and anger within the Papuan community.
New Zealand has successfully promoted and supported dialogue for Bougainville and can now be a credible advocate for peace and dialogue again, but action needs to be taken urgently.
Rt Hon John Key,
Prime Minister,
Parliament Buildings,
Wellington
Hon Murray McCully,
Parliament Buildings,
Wellington
Dear Mr Key and Mr McCully,
The Indonesia Human Rights Committee is deeply concerned about the possibility of escalating conflict in West Papua in the wake of the death of OPM (Free West Papua Movement) leader, Kelly Kwalik. We believe that an internationally mediated dialogue between Papuan representatives and the Indonesian Government is now imperative.
We call on the New Zealand Government to publicly back negotiation and dialogue as the path to peace in West Papua.
Kelly Kwalik died after he was shot by the Police Mobile Brigade and the anti-terror force Detachment 88 on December 16. He is reported to have died after being taken to hospital but the circumstances of his death have not been made clear.
Since Kelly Kwalik’s death there has been an outpouring of grief and anger within the West Papuan community, including considerable tension around the funeral arrangements and burial site. Requests for the nationalist ‘Morning Star’ flag to be flown at the time of the funeral were turned down, but his coffin was defiantly draped in the flag. There have been pro-independence demonstrations and calls for the Freeport McMoran mine to be closed, by Papuan customary leaders. Kelly Kwalik and his people were dispossessed by the mine and many believe that Freeport was indirectly responsible for his death.
The Timika Catholic Bishop John Philip Saklil, who led the service, said that Kelly Kwalik was a patriot who had dedicated his life to the land of Papua. It is widely acknowledged that in recent years Kelly Kwalik had turned from armed struggle to the pursuit of dialogue with Indonesia and support for a Zone of Peace.
Despite some claims in the Indonesian media, we believe that it is not credible that that Kelly Kwalik was responsible for the lethal attacks in the Timika area in this year and in 2002. The deaths in 2002 of 3 teachers including 2 Americans, have been subject to independent human rights investigations which indicate that the military was involved in these attacks. Not long before his death, Kelly Kwalik met with security officials and denied that he had any involvement in this year’s attacks in the mine area. We understand that the police supported his claims, refuting earlier comments from the military of OPM involvement in the attacks.
We believe that the West Papuan people and the rest of the world want answers to questions relating to the method and reasons why Kelly Kwalik died. There are also unanswered questions about the fate of those arrested at the time of the shooting
of Kelly Kwalik, especially as one the five arrested was a ten year old boy.
But most importantly, we believe that West Papua’s Pacific neighbours, including New Zealand should now join the call for the Indonesian Government to respond to the demands of the West Papuan people for peaceful dialogue. There must be a just and open process to address deep grievances including the marginalisation of the indigenous people and decades of documented cases of police and military killings and brutality. West Papua also experiences desperate health circumstances, an epidemic of HIV/Aids and rampant deforestation and environmental destruction.
It is time for New Zealand, which successfully supported peaceful negotiations for another Melanesian territory, Bougainville, to take up the cause of peace and dialogue again.
Yours sincerely,
Maire Leadbeater
(for the Indonesia Human Rights Committee)
ENDS
Saturday 12 December 2009
Big win for West Papuan refugees
IT’S nearly four years since 43 refugees made world headlines after paddling an outrigger canoe from their West Papuan homelands to Australia.
Now living in public housing estates in North Melbourne, Collingwood and Richmond, the group reunited last week to celebrate West Papuan Independence Day by thrashing local police officers in a soccer match.
One of the boat people, 26-year-old Adolf Mora, said they also marked the occasion by raising the West Papuan flag and singing their national anthem.
“If we did that in West Papua then we get killed straight away because the (Indonesian) army will go looking for us,” Mr Mora said.
As well as earning the group political asylum in Australia, their courageous five-day sea voyage sparked a diplomatic row between the governments of their adopted nation and Indonesia, which annexed West Papua in 1969.
While Indonesia officially granted West Papua autonomy in 2001, there have been numerous reports of the Indonesian army murdering indigenous residents since then.
“That’s why we left because there is no justice or freedom and no standing for your rights. That’s why we climb into a boat to Australia where it is free for us,” Mr Mora said.
What they thought would be a one-day journey soon turned into a nightmare for the group, aged between three and 48, when the motor on their canoe stopped just off the coast of West Papua.
With no food or even a compass for navigation, they spent the next five days relying on rainwater for energy as they paddled and sailed the 25m boat for 300km through stormy seas until they reached the tip of Cape York on January 18, 2006.
“Everyone thought we would disappear and we would all die, but it looks like the gods had made the rain to give us energy and wind to give us direction,” Mr Mora said. Soon after their arrival, the group was sent to Melbourne and in January this year they were granted permanent residency.
Mr Mora lives at the Collingwood high-rise flats and has found a job working to help other refugees and migrants for Fitzroy-based charity Brotherhood of St Laurence.
Leading Sen-Constable Danash Schneider from the Victoria Police multicultural liaison unit watched on last week as Victoria Police’s prized soccer team was beaten 5-2.
“The police team are all pretty good players but these West Papuans were half our size and twice as fast so we were left pretty stunned,” he said.
Resource:
http://melbourne-leader.whereilive.com.au/news/story/big-win-for-west-papuan-refugees/
Now living in public housing estates in North Melbourne, Collingwood and Richmond, the group reunited last week to celebrate West Papuan Independence Day by thrashing local police officers in a soccer match.
One of the boat people, 26-year-old Adolf Mora, said they also marked the occasion by raising the West Papuan flag and singing their national anthem.
“If we did that in West Papua then we get killed straight away because the (Indonesian) army will go looking for us,” Mr Mora said.
As well as earning the group political asylum in Australia, their courageous five-day sea voyage sparked a diplomatic row between the governments of their adopted nation and Indonesia, which annexed West Papua in 1969.
While Indonesia officially granted West Papua autonomy in 2001, there have been numerous reports of the Indonesian army murdering indigenous residents since then.
“That’s why we left because there is no justice or freedom and no standing for your rights. That’s why we climb into a boat to Australia where it is free for us,” Mr Mora said.
What they thought would be a one-day journey soon turned into a nightmare for the group, aged between three and 48, when the motor on their canoe stopped just off the coast of West Papua.
With no food or even a compass for navigation, they spent the next five days relying on rainwater for energy as they paddled and sailed the 25m boat for 300km through stormy seas until they reached the tip of Cape York on January 18, 2006.
“Everyone thought we would disappear and we would all die, but it looks like the gods had made the rain to give us energy and wind to give us direction,” Mr Mora said. Soon after their arrival, the group was sent to Melbourne and in January this year they were granted permanent residency.
Mr Mora lives at the Collingwood high-rise flats and has found a job working to help other refugees and migrants for Fitzroy-based charity Brotherhood of St Laurence.
Leading Sen-Constable Danash Schneider from the Victoria Police multicultural liaison unit watched on last week as Victoria Police’s prized soccer team was beaten 5-2.
“The police team are all pretty good players but these West Papuans were half our size and twice as fast so we were left pretty stunned,” he said.
Resource:
http://melbourne-leader.whereilive.com.au/news/story/big-win-for-west-papuan-refugees/
Terror, resistance and trauma in West Papua
Pacific Scoop
By Budi Hernawan OFM
Papua recently attracted the attention of the international community, and in particular of Australia, when Australian citizen Drew Grant was killed in a shooting incident in the early morning of 11 July 2009 in the Freeport Mining area in Tembagapura, Papua (The Jakarta Globe, 13 July 2009).
This killing ignited a series of violent acts in the world largest gold and copper mine site.
Police are yet to provide an explanation of the incident. The shooting immediately sparked speculation in the public and international media forcing a highly-ranked representative of the Indonesian Government to provide a public statement. On 16 July the Minister of Defence, Yuwono Sudarsono, claimed that a ‘rogue element’ in the military might have been involved in the shooting (ABC News, 16 July 2009).
Despite the lack of strong evidence, the police arrested and detained 9 civilians on 20 July 2009 and charged them with murder, even though the unidentified gunmen continued to engage in acts of shooting (The Jakarta Post, 12/8/09). This story sounds familiar for many Papuans, recalling memories of a similar incident in August 2002, when one Indonesian and two American teachers were shot dead in an ambush at the Freeport Mining site.
Such an incident might represent the spectre of terror that marks the landscape of Freeport mining area (Ballard 2002) and has shaped memoria passionis of the Papuans as a whole. As a response to the repeated terror, the Papuans expressed their opposition to be continuously blamed as a scapegoat.
In a rarely issued public statement dated 15 July 2009, Kelly Kwalik, the leader of the Organisasi Pembebasan Papoea Merdeka (OPM) in the Timika area, expressed his strong denial that he or his group was involved in the attack in any way (Kwalik 2009).
This act illustrates the resistance aspect in Papua that responds to prolonged oppressive mechanisms that sacrifice Papuans. Over time, terror and resistance have become a dialectic that leaves the Papuans traumatised and forms an unbreakable cycle. This current pattern of terror needs to be understood within Papua’s broader historical context and the legacy of the region’s early history.
This paper does not intend to provide an in-depth examination of Papua’s history. Rather, it aims to reflect on the prolonged terror, resistance movements and trauma that have characterised Papua to date. Yet in order to do so, we need to trace the historical context, including in particular the transfer of this area to Indonesian administration on 1 May 1963 by the United Nations Temporary Executive Authority (UNTEA), under Article XII of the 1962 New York Agreement.
The paper begins by summarising the key arguments that scholars suggested underpinned the power struggle between Indonesia and the Netherlands. Secondly, it discusses the establishment of control mechanisms that have resulted in a dialectic of terror and resistance. Thirdly, it briefly explores trauma as an impact of the dialectic of terror and resistance.
Click here to read the full report into this issue.
Budi Hernawan OFM is a PhD Candidate at the Regulatory Institutions Network, Australian National University. The author is a Franciscan friar who previously worked for ten years at the Office for Justice and Peace of the Catholic Church in Jayapura, West Papua, Indonesia.
ENDS
http://pacific.scoop.co.nz/2009/12/terror-resistance-and-trauma-in-west-papua/
By Budi Hernawan OFM
Papua recently attracted the attention of the international community, and in particular of Australia, when Australian citizen Drew Grant was killed in a shooting incident in the early morning of 11 July 2009 in the Freeport Mining area in Tembagapura, Papua (The Jakarta Globe, 13 July 2009).
This killing ignited a series of violent acts in the world largest gold and copper mine site.
Police are yet to provide an explanation of the incident. The shooting immediately sparked speculation in the public and international media forcing a highly-ranked representative of the Indonesian Government to provide a public statement. On 16 July the Minister of Defence, Yuwono Sudarsono, claimed that a ‘rogue element’ in the military might have been involved in the shooting (ABC News, 16 July 2009).
Despite the lack of strong evidence, the police arrested and detained 9 civilians on 20 July 2009 and charged them with murder, even though the unidentified gunmen continued to engage in acts of shooting (The Jakarta Post, 12/8/09). This story sounds familiar for many Papuans, recalling memories of a similar incident in August 2002, when one Indonesian and two American teachers were shot dead in an ambush at the Freeport Mining site.
Such an incident might represent the spectre of terror that marks the landscape of Freeport mining area (Ballard 2002) and has shaped memoria passionis of the Papuans as a whole. As a response to the repeated terror, the Papuans expressed their opposition to be continuously blamed as a scapegoat.
In a rarely issued public statement dated 15 July 2009, Kelly Kwalik, the leader of the Organisasi Pembebasan Papoea Merdeka (OPM) in the Timika area, expressed his strong denial that he or his group was involved in the attack in any way (Kwalik 2009).
This act illustrates the resistance aspect in Papua that responds to prolonged oppressive mechanisms that sacrifice Papuans. Over time, terror and resistance have become a dialectic that leaves the Papuans traumatised and forms an unbreakable cycle. This current pattern of terror needs to be understood within Papua’s broader historical context and the legacy of the region’s early history.
This paper does not intend to provide an in-depth examination of Papua’s history. Rather, it aims to reflect on the prolonged terror, resistance movements and trauma that have characterised Papua to date. Yet in order to do so, we need to trace the historical context, including in particular the transfer of this area to Indonesian administration on 1 May 1963 by the United Nations Temporary Executive Authority (UNTEA), under Article XII of the 1962 New York Agreement.
The paper begins by summarising the key arguments that scholars suggested underpinned the power struggle between Indonesia and the Netherlands. Secondly, it discusses the establishment of control mechanisms that have resulted in a dialectic of terror and resistance. Thirdly, it briefly explores trauma as an impact of the dialectic of terror and resistance.
Click here to read the full report into this issue.
Budi Hernawan OFM is a PhD Candidate at the Regulatory Institutions Network, Australian National University. The author is a Franciscan friar who previously worked for ten years at the Office for Justice and Peace of the Catholic Church in Jayapura, West Papua, Indonesia.
ENDS
http://pacific.scoop.co.nz/2009/12/terror-resistance-and-trauma-in-west-papua/
Road Blocked for Papuan Autonomy
The Indonesian state’s promise of empowerment to Papuans has proved inadequate. A new focus is needed, says Charles Reading for openDemocracy.
By Charles Reading for openDemocracy.net
In the easternmost provinces of Indonesia, the first day of December each year has come to represent the day when those calling for a separate Papuan state take to the streets and make their voices heard. The date holds historical significance: it was on 1 December 1962 that the Dutch allowed the Papuan Bintang Kejora (morning star) to fly next to their own flag as a step to preparing Papua - the eastern half of New Guinea, the second largest island in the world - for independence. But in 1969, Indonesia annexed Papua (formerly also known as West Papua or Irian Jaya) through the vehicle of a controversial referendum. Since then, 1 December has become a focal point for Papuan resentment towards the Indonesian state.
This year was no different. 1 December 2009 was marked by demonstrations, flag-raisings, bouts of repression and nervous police ambiguously applying the law in the name of state security. At the same time, there is something misleading about seeing the Papuan cause (as parties on both sides of the divide tend to do) mainly through the lens of an ethnic Papuan nationalism or of a civic Indonesian nationalism. For the talk of nationalism, as of states and ideologies, tends to distract attention from the more immediate realities of social, political and economic disempowerment. These are vital triggers of protest against the Indonesian state and its regulations, and provide a valuable if neglected guide to the condition of the Papuan struggle.
The failure of reform
Indonesia’s Otonomi Khusus (special-autonomy law, known colloquially as otsus) of 2001 aimed to address the structural problems faced by Papuans. Eight years on, an increasing number of Papuans believe that it has failed to deliver. A group of Papuans were arrested on 16 November 2009 in Jayapura for raising the Bintang Kejora flag - an illegal act that can incur up to fifteen years’ imprisonment, according to a presidential regulation of 2008 that bans separatist symbols - for handing out flyers condemning the flaws of the otsus law. More widely, otsus has moved from a proposed solution to the deprivations faced by many in Papua to the heart of people’s disillusion. Why then has it proved incapable of delivering on its promise?
When the Otonomi Khusus was first implemented, Papuans hoped it would concentrate on developing the territory, relieving poverty, guaranteeing to Papuans demographic and cultural representation in their own politics, and addressing the human-rights atrocities of the “new order” era under Indonesia’s former president, Suharto. Its scope covered many of the demands made by the Papua Presidium Council in the early years of Indonesia’s reformasi transition period - with the exception of independence itself. Yet, almost immediately, its impact was hampered both by a reluctance of the state-security forces to change their security-centric ideology and by a neglect of the process essential to implementing it.
True, otsus has increased the amount of funds transferred from Jakarta to Papua’s two provincial governments (to an estimated at Rp 20 trillion [$1.7 billion] per year) - more than any other region in the country. Yet the two provinces are still listed as the poorest in the country; the World Bank and Indonesia’s central board of statistics estimate that 37% of the population live below the poverty-line. In the absence of adequate regulation of how funds are allocated, much of the money ends up in political pockets or in Indonesia’s notoriously corrupt construction industry.
The current Papuan provincial governor, Barnabas Suebu, has managed to distribute some of the wealth to the village level through his Rural Development Strategic Programme (RESPEK); although the usefulness and transparency of doling out lump-sums to village heads, rather than (for example) investing in education or health facilities, is questionable.
Otsus also requires cultural and political representation of indigenous Papuans, through the creation in 2005 of the Majelis Rakyat Papua (Papuan People’s Council [MRP]) and the reserving of eleven seats for indigenous Papuans in the Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Papua (Papuan provincial parliament). But the actual ability of the MRP to promote cultural laws has been limited; and on 29 October 2009, on the fourth anniversary of the council’s inauguration, student protesters in Jayapura denounced its ineffectiveness and demanded that it be disbanded. So far, otsus has been incapable of becoming a vehicle for Papuan political empowerment.
In addition, a “unity and reconciliation” law passed in 2000 by the Indonesian parliament’s upper house provided for a truth-and-reconciliation commission (TRC) that would examine past human-rights abuses by the Indonesian security forces in Papua and other regions throughout the archipelago). This has still not been established, and the military and police remain covered in a cloak of impunity. With no checks and balances or self-criticism by the Indonesian security forces, Papuans are vulnerable to extortion and abuse of power by underpaid soldiers and police personnel.
The Indonesian army chief-of-staff George Toisutta stated on 12 November 2009 that a new military command will be set up in West Papua province (the northwest peninsula of the territory) in addition to the Cenderawasih regional command in Papua province). This inevitably will lead to an increase in troops stationed in remote areas who are able to abuse their power and cause misery for many citizens.
A new focus
Perhaps most disturbing of all about the years 2001-09 in Papua is that, despite a huge flow of funds into the region, little educational and health infrastructure has been created. The governor’s annual promises to grant free access to both these primary services have not been fulfilled. Children living in rural areas (and even parts of Jayapura) often attend understaffed schools that lack basic infrastructure, including electricity. Meanwhile, access to basic medicines and treatment is difficult at best; hospitals work amid frequent power-cuts, a lack of doctors, and shortages of up-to-date medicines. A lack of health education is prevalent, with HIV/Aids becoming a problem amongst the indigenous Papuan population. The provincial governments’ approaches to HIV/Aids - including a plan (soon abandoned) to install microchips in all HIV/Aids sufferers so their movements could be tracked - do little to educate people appropriately to the dangers.
These problems facing the people of Papua highlight the need to look beyond state-centric and historic debates revolving around Papuan independence or Indonesian security-ideology, and focus more on the material and development challenges faced in the region. There is a tendency, in Papua and comparable situations, to romanticise or denounce agencies of resistance; it may be more valuable to examine the everyday structures that lead to the economic, social and political disempowerment of an indigenous population. This in turn could become part of a much needed dialogue about how the people of Papua can partake in the future of their homeland.
Charles Reading is an openDemocracy contributor.
http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Current-Affairs/Security-Watch/Detail/?ots591=4888CAA0-B3DB-1461-98B9-E20E7B9C13D4&lng=en&id=110353
By Charles Reading for openDemocracy.net
In the easternmost provinces of Indonesia, the first day of December each year has come to represent the day when those calling for a separate Papuan state take to the streets and make their voices heard. The date holds historical significance: it was on 1 December 1962 that the Dutch allowed the Papuan Bintang Kejora (morning star) to fly next to their own flag as a step to preparing Papua - the eastern half of New Guinea, the second largest island in the world - for independence. But in 1969, Indonesia annexed Papua (formerly also known as West Papua or Irian Jaya) through the vehicle of a controversial referendum. Since then, 1 December has become a focal point for Papuan resentment towards the Indonesian state.
This year was no different. 1 December 2009 was marked by demonstrations, flag-raisings, bouts of repression and nervous police ambiguously applying the law in the name of state security. At the same time, there is something misleading about seeing the Papuan cause (as parties on both sides of the divide tend to do) mainly through the lens of an ethnic Papuan nationalism or of a civic Indonesian nationalism. For the talk of nationalism, as of states and ideologies, tends to distract attention from the more immediate realities of social, political and economic disempowerment. These are vital triggers of protest against the Indonesian state and its regulations, and provide a valuable if neglected guide to the condition of the Papuan struggle.
The failure of reform
Indonesia’s Otonomi Khusus (special-autonomy law, known colloquially as otsus) of 2001 aimed to address the structural problems faced by Papuans. Eight years on, an increasing number of Papuans believe that it has failed to deliver. A group of Papuans were arrested on 16 November 2009 in Jayapura for raising the Bintang Kejora flag - an illegal act that can incur up to fifteen years’ imprisonment, according to a presidential regulation of 2008 that bans separatist symbols - for handing out flyers condemning the flaws of the otsus law. More widely, otsus has moved from a proposed solution to the deprivations faced by many in Papua to the heart of people’s disillusion. Why then has it proved incapable of delivering on its promise?
When the Otonomi Khusus was first implemented, Papuans hoped it would concentrate on developing the territory, relieving poverty, guaranteeing to Papuans demographic and cultural representation in their own politics, and addressing the human-rights atrocities of the “new order” era under Indonesia’s former president, Suharto. Its scope covered many of the demands made by the Papua Presidium Council in the early years of Indonesia’s reformasi transition period - with the exception of independence itself. Yet, almost immediately, its impact was hampered both by a reluctance of the state-security forces to change their security-centric ideology and by a neglect of the process essential to implementing it.
True, otsus has increased the amount of funds transferred from Jakarta to Papua’s two provincial governments (to an estimated at Rp 20 trillion [$1.7 billion] per year) - more than any other region in the country. Yet the two provinces are still listed as the poorest in the country; the World Bank and Indonesia’s central board of statistics estimate that 37% of the population live below the poverty-line. In the absence of adequate regulation of how funds are allocated, much of the money ends up in political pockets or in Indonesia’s notoriously corrupt construction industry.
The current Papuan provincial governor, Barnabas Suebu, has managed to distribute some of the wealth to the village level through his Rural Development Strategic Programme (RESPEK); although the usefulness and transparency of doling out lump-sums to village heads, rather than (for example) investing in education or health facilities, is questionable.
Otsus also requires cultural and political representation of indigenous Papuans, through the creation in 2005 of the Majelis Rakyat Papua (Papuan People’s Council [MRP]) and the reserving of eleven seats for indigenous Papuans in the Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Papua (Papuan provincial parliament). But the actual ability of the MRP to promote cultural laws has been limited; and on 29 October 2009, on the fourth anniversary of the council’s inauguration, student protesters in Jayapura denounced its ineffectiveness and demanded that it be disbanded. So far, otsus has been incapable of becoming a vehicle for Papuan political empowerment.
In addition, a “unity and reconciliation” law passed in 2000 by the Indonesian parliament’s upper house provided for a truth-and-reconciliation commission (TRC) that would examine past human-rights abuses by the Indonesian security forces in Papua and other regions throughout the archipelago). This has still not been established, and the military and police remain covered in a cloak of impunity. With no checks and balances or self-criticism by the Indonesian security forces, Papuans are vulnerable to extortion and abuse of power by underpaid soldiers and police personnel.
The Indonesian army chief-of-staff George Toisutta stated on 12 November 2009 that a new military command will be set up in West Papua province (the northwest peninsula of the territory) in addition to the Cenderawasih regional command in Papua province). This inevitably will lead to an increase in troops stationed in remote areas who are able to abuse their power and cause misery for many citizens.
A new focus
Perhaps most disturbing of all about the years 2001-09 in Papua is that, despite a huge flow of funds into the region, little educational and health infrastructure has been created. The governor’s annual promises to grant free access to both these primary services have not been fulfilled. Children living in rural areas (and even parts of Jayapura) often attend understaffed schools that lack basic infrastructure, including electricity. Meanwhile, access to basic medicines and treatment is difficult at best; hospitals work amid frequent power-cuts, a lack of doctors, and shortages of up-to-date medicines. A lack of health education is prevalent, with HIV/Aids becoming a problem amongst the indigenous Papuan population. The provincial governments’ approaches to HIV/Aids - including a plan (soon abandoned) to install microchips in all HIV/Aids sufferers so their movements could be tracked - do little to educate people appropriately to the dangers.
These problems facing the people of Papua highlight the need to look beyond state-centric and historic debates revolving around Papuan independence or Indonesian security-ideology, and focus more on the material and development challenges faced in the region. There is a tendency, in Papua and comparable situations, to romanticise or denounce agencies of resistance; it may be more valuable to examine the everyday structures that lead to the economic, social and political disempowerment of an indigenous population. This in turn could become part of a much needed dialogue about how the people of Papua can partake in the future of their homeland.
Charles Reading is an openDemocracy contributor.
http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Current-Affairs/Security-Watch/Detail/?ots591=4888CAA0-B3DB-1461-98B9-E20E7B9C13D4&lng=en&id=110353
Border in Papua Disputed
Thursday, 10 December, 2009 | 14:20 WIB
TEMPO Interactive, TIMIKA:Around 200 residents of Ugimba, Paniai regency in Papua, yesterday insisted that the Mimika Regent resolve the issue concerning the border between Mimia and Paniai regencies.
Those who claimed to be the owners of the communal land rights of the Grassberg area have demanded compensation for PT Freeport Indonesia’s mining operations.
They also insisted the Mimika regional government resolve this issue with the Papua governor using customary laws.
“This has been discussed with Mimika regent,” said one protestor, Samuel Tabuni.
The Mimika regent, Klemen Tinal, said the government was ready to facilitate a meeting between Ugimba residents and the Papua governor.
When the Mimika Regency was set up in 2000, the residents of Ugimba were included in the Mimika Regency area.
However, most of the residents still acknowledge that they are part of Paniai regency, Sugapa District.
TJAHJONO EP
TEMPO Interactive, TIMIKA:Around 200 residents of Ugimba, Paniai regency in Papua, yesterday insisted that the Mimika Regent resolve the issue concerning the border between Mimia and Paniai regencies.
Those who claimed to be the owners of the communal land rights of the Grassberg area have demanded compensation for PT Freeport Indonesia’s mining operations.
They also insisted the Mimika regional government resolve this issue with the Papua governor using customary laws.
“This has been discussed with Mimika regent,” said one protestor, Samuel Tabuni.
The Mimika regent, Klemen Tinal, said the government was ready to facilitate a meeting between Ugimba residents and the Papua governor.
When the Mimika Regency was set up in 2000, the residents of Ugimba were included in the Mimika Regency area.
However, most of the residents still acknowledge that they are part of Paniai regency, Sugapa District.
TJAHJONO EP
Human rights award to Indonesian priest working among Papuan rebels
by Mathias Hariyadi
Fr Johannes Jonga has been a parish priest in Keerom district since 2001. The area has been the scene of clashes between pro-independence fighters and the army. He has helped rebels and local civilians alike against abuses by the military and multinationals. The president of the Indonesian Human Right Commission praises his for doing his work despite “threats from the military.”
Jakarta (AsiaNews) – Fr Johannes Jonga Pr, a 51-year-old Indonesian priest, won the 2009 Yam Thiam Hien Award, a national prize that goes people who have shown an outstanding commitment to peace, human rights and human dignity. A diocesan priest from Jayapura, Father Jonga is being recognised for his work on behalf of the population of Papua Province.
Originally from Manggarai, the clergyman has been parish priest at Saint Michael’s Church in Waris since 2001. The small town in Keerom district lies on the border with Papua-New Guinea.
This has meant that Father Jonga has had to deal with the consequences of the conflict between the Papua Independence Organisation (Organisasi Papua Merdeka or OPM) and the army since the start of his mission.
In Papua, Indonesia’s easternmost province, OPM separatists have been demanding independence from Indonesia.
For many pro-independence fighters, Keerom district is a safe haven just before the border with independent Papua-New Guinea.
Father Jonga has met many of those on the run from the Indonesian military. He has helped them without consideration for their politics and has joined local populations in pressing claims against soldiers and multinationals that violated their rights. He has become a thorn in the side of the military.
Today, Ifdhal Kasim, president of the Indonesian Human Right Commission and member of Yap Thiam Hien Award jury committee, said that Father Jonga deserves the prize for his “service to local people” against threats from security officials, mostly when Papua was still officially classified as a “war zone” by the Indonesian military because of sporadic action by the OPM.
Fr Johannes Jonga has been a parish priest in Keerom district since 2001. The area has been the scene of clashes between pro-independence fighters and the army. He has helped rebels and local civilians alike against abuses by the military and multinationals. The president of the Indonesian Human Right Commission praises his for doing his work despite “threats from the military.”
Jakarta (AsiaNews) – Fr Johannes Jonga Pr, a 51-year-old Indonesian priest, won the 2009 Yam Thiam Hien Award, a national prize that goes people who have shown an outstanding commitment to peace, human rights and human dignity. A diocesan priest from Jayapura, Father Jonga is being recognised for his work on behalf of the population of Papua Province.
Originally from Manggarai, the clergyman has been parish priest at Saint Michael’s Church in Waris since 2001. The small town in Keerom district lies on the border with Papua-New Guinea.
This has meant that Father Jonga has had to deal with the consequences of the conflict between the Papua Independence Organisation (Organisasi Papua Merdeka or OPM) and the army since the start of his mission.
In Papua, Indonesia’s easternmost province, OPM separatists have been demanding independence from Indonesia.
For many pro-independence fighters, Keerom district is a safe haven just before the border with independent Papua-New Guinea.
Father Jonga has met many of those on the run from the Indonesian military. He has helped them without consideration for their politics and has joined local populations in pressing claims against soldiers and multinationals that violated their rights. He has become a thorn in the side of the military.
Today, Ifdhal Kasim, president of the Indonesian Human Right Commission and member of Yap Thiam Hien Award jury committee, said that Father Jonga deserves the prize for his “service to local people” against threats from security officials, mostly when Papua was still officially classified as a “war zone” by the Indonesian military because of sporadic action by the OPM.
Wednesday 9 September 2009
West Papua Report
September 2009
This is the 64th in a series of monthly reports that focus on developments affecting Papuans. This series is produced by the non-profit West Papua Advocacy Team (WPAT) drawing on media accounts, other NGO assessments, and analysis and reporting from sources within West Papua. This report is co-published with the East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) Back issues are posted online at http://etan.org/issues/wpapua/default.htm Questions regarding this report can be addressed to Edmund McWilliams at edmcw@msn.com.
Summary:
There were Indonesian security force attacks on Papuan civilians in August with reports of continuing assaults in Puncak Jaya and a new report from Yapen island where security forces terrorized villagers following security force murder of a tribal leader and former political prisoner. Amnesty -recognized prisoner of conscience Filep Karma has been hospitalized after a week's delay in medical attention at the notorious Abepura prison. The Australian Senate has called for a return of the Committee of the Red Cross to West Papua after Indonesian officials closed its offices there in the wake of an ICRC visit to Abepura prison this Spring. Despite the jailing of several Papuans alleged to have been behind July attacks in the area of the Freeport mining concession, attacks continued in August. Amnesty has issued a public statement decrying the lack of progress in the investigation of the murder of Papuan activist Opinus Tabuni. Officials of the Home Affairs Ministry have met with Papuans in a rare dialogue. The discussion falls far short of the senior-level, ly mediated dialogue that Papuans have been seeking for several years. More than a dozen organizations meeting in Dili have urged an end to impunity for Indonesian security forces operating in West Papua and for a positive Jakarta response to Papuan calls for dialogue. Senior Papuans, in a late August conference, have emphasized the failure of "special autonomy" to address Papuan needs. Conservation groups have joined together to create a protected region in the waters off West Papua's "bird's head" region.
Contents
Security Forces Burn Homes and Churches in Puncak Jaya Region and Terrorize Civilians in Yapen Island
Inadequate Medical Response to Illness of Papuan Prisoner of Conscience
Australian Government Voices Concern Over Banning of ICRC in West Papua
Attacks on Freeport Vehicles Continue in August Despite July Arrests
Amnesty Statement Decries Lack of Progress in Investigation of Murdered Peaceful Papuan Protester
Low-Level Dialogue Between Papuans and Indonesian Government Officials
At Conference in Dili Call for End to Impunity in West Papua
Addressing the Moribund "Special Autonomy" Policy
Prominent NGO's Join Forces to Protect "Bird's Head" Region
Indonesian Military Forces Burn Homes and Churches in Puncak Jaya Region and in Yapen Island
Papuan sources are reporting Indonesian military attacks on civilians in remote regions of West Papua. These include continued attacks in the long-troubled Puncak Jaya region and reports of new attacks on Yapen island. The remoteness of these regions and Indonesian government restrictions on access by journalists and human rights officials generally in West Papua delays and limits the flow of information on these incidents. The following is known:
Indonesian military forces (TNI) on August 28 conducted a joint operation in Kalome village, Tingginambut district, Puncak Jaya regency. The Indonesian troops burned all the villages honay (traditional round houses) and two churches. The civilian casualty count resulting from this action is as yet not known. (See the June issue of the West Papua report for additional reporting regarding marauding Indonesian-military led "sweep" operations now ongoing in West Papua's central highlands region of Puncak Jaya.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The remoteness of these regions and Indonesian government restrictions on access by journalists and human rights officials generally in West Papua delays and limits the flow of information on these incidents.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In recent months various sources have reported on tension in the area. Much of the tension arises from a rivalry between TNI personnel and the police which run or extort local businesses. Kopassus (Indonesian special forces), Kodim (regional command) and Brimob (the militarized police) are behind most of businesses in Tingginambut. Local people must pay high fees imposed by local security forces for essentials. In addition, there are huge illegal mining activities in the region which are run by or in collaboration with government security forces. Earlier this year a Brimob officer was shot to death in Tingginambut. Many observers doubted the official version that the armed Papuan opposition was responsible for the killing, suspecting instead that the killers were Brimob rivals from Kopassus.
In a second report, two sources on Yapen Island have reported that following the murder of Yawan Wayeni, a tribal leader and nine-year political prisoner during the Suharto dictatorship, in his house in Mantembu village. Following the August 2 murder of Wayeni by Brimob forces, Indonesian forces, on August 3, conducted what the troops described as a "shooting practice" in Mantembu, terrorizing villagers, mostly farmers. Reports claimed that soldiers arrived aboard two trucks several jeeps and dozens of motorcycles.
Yapen police chief Imam Setiawan said that his men had to shoot Yawan Wayeni because he was armed. "We had to shoot first after which we evacuated him to the hospital. He died during the trip to a local hospital. He was shot in the thigh and stomach," said Setiawan as quoted by the Cenderawasih Pos daily. Setiawan claimed that his men had seized a hand-made gun.
Travel to Yapen entails an eight-hour ferry ride from Biak Island. Biak itself is about one hour by air from Jayapura, the capital of Papua.
Inadequate Medical Response to Illness of Papuan Prisoner of Conscience
Filep Karma who is serving his sentence in the Abepura Prison in August was placed in the intensive care ward at the Dok Dua Hospital in Jayapura. After suffering intense abdominal pain for over one week he was finally transferred from the Abepura prison to the hospital on August 18. The transfer took place only after local a facebook and SMS campaign regarding his serious and deteriorating condition.
Karma, a West Papuan, was sentenced in 2008 to 15 years in prison for participation in a rally where the West Papuan national flag, the Morning Star was raised. That ceremony was a peaceful exercise of the right to freedom of expression. Amnesty and other human rights organizations regard Karma among the dozens of Papuan prisoners of conscience now in Indonesian custody. His case, and that of fellow prisoner of conscience Yusuf Pakage, was the subject of a U.S. Congressional letter to President Yudhoyono that was signed by 40 members of the U.S. Congress in 2008.
A Human Rights Watch report in June (see West Papua Report for July) reported on the abuse of prisoners in the Abepura Prison in West Papua. Its June 5 report, "Indonesia: Stop Prison Brutality in Papua," called on the Indonesian Government to "investigate and hold accountable abusive guards and officials at the Abepura prison in Papua." According to the report, "sources report that torture, beatings, and mistreatment by guards are rampant." HRW also noted that among the approximately 230 prisoners at the facility, "more than a dozen are imprisoned for peaceful political acts." In 2007, a United Nations special report also focused on abuse in Indonesian detention and noted particular serious abuse in facilities located in West Papua. In early 2009, Indonesian authorities ordered the Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to close its office in West Papua. The order followed an ICRC visit to prisoners in the Abepura prison.
Indonesian authorities resistance to concern about conditions in detention facilities in West Papua continues. On August 21 the Indonesian Foreign Affairs Ministry issued a statement that rejected calls for a restoration of the West Papua office of the Committee of the Red Cross. The previous Red Cross office was forced to shut and leave West Papua earlier this year after its staff members visited prisoners in jail in West Papua.
Australian Government Voices Concern Over Banning of ICRC in West Papua
An August 21 Radio Australia report noted that Australia's government has sent a quiet signal to Indonesia about mounting concern over human rights conditions in West Papua. The Rudd government -- facing accusations it's too quite on the issue - has allowed its Senators to support a motion in Parliament's upper house that calls for pressure from Canberra on Indonesia to allow the return of the Red Cross to West Papua.
The motion calls on the Australian government to urge Indonesia to allow the Red Cross full and unfettered access in West Papua. The Red Cross was forced to leave Papua in April after it made visits to jailed Papuan separatists. Indonesia claims the Red Cross operation in Papua breached its agreement with Jakarta. The Red Cross claims discussions with the Indonesian government are ongoing.
Attacks on Freeport Vehicles Continue in August Despite July Arrests
Despite the arrest of seven Papuans alleged to be behind the mid July attacks on Freeport personnel traveling on the Timika-Tembagapura road, attacks along that road have continued. (The 79 mile route connects the seaport town of Timika to Freeport's Grassberg mine complex.) On August 12 an employee bus was attacked. No one was injured or died as a result of this incident. On August 16 a convoy of Freeport's buses was attacked despite a police/military escort. Six employees were injured in this incident. On August 26, unknown persons cut the Freeport mine pipe at Mile 63 on the route. On August 28, a gun battle took place between Brimob personnel and an unknown group at Mile 41. Military and police personnel exchanged fire for about five to ten minutes at mile 42 -- 42 along the main road connecting Timika and Tembagapura. The shooting was sparked by gunfire at a bus carrying workers from security post at mile 50 to Timika.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The four-decade old Freeport mining complex has long been the source of protest among Papuans who have seen mine-related devastation
of their environment and displacement of Papuans from their homes. Indonesian security forces paid by Freeport have regularly violated the human rights of local Papuans.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On August 27 a Tempo Interactive report noted that Freeport would henceforth provide an armored vehicle accompaniment for convoys operating within the mine concession territory and that Freeport drivers would be provided with bullet proof vests and helmets. The Freeport action came in response to demands by drivers for better protection.
The August developments have added mystery to the tense environment surrounding the U.S.-based Freeport operation, the largest copper and gold mine in the world. The four-decade old mining complex has long been the source of protest among Papuans who have seen mine-related devastation
of their environment and displacement of Papuans from their homes. Indonesian security forces paid by Freeport have regularly violated the human rights of local Papuans.
The August attacks also raise a fundamental question of justice regarding those Papuans jailed for the July attacks. Charges against them in July appear to be refuted by the continuing attacks in August.
In late August, the TNI announced that 600 military personnel would take up security duties for the Freeport facility beginning September 2. Many analysts had speculated that the July-August shootings in the vicinity of the Freeport concession may have had the goal of creating instability with the ultimate intention of re-establishing TNI's lead role for provision of security in the area, a role that had been highly lucrative for the TNI over several decades.
Amnesty Statement Decries Lack of Progress in Investigation of Murdered Peaceful Papuan Protester
An August 11 Public statement by Amnesty decried the failure of Indonesian officials to make progress in the investigation of the killing of Papuan protester Opinus Tabuni, one year after the incident. The statement noted that the absence of progress in the investigation underscored the continued lack of accountability in cases involving the lethal use of firearms by law enforcement officials.
Opinus Tabuni, aged 35, was part of a peaceful rally celebrating United Nations Indigenous People's Day on 9 August 2008 in Wamena, West Papua. Also present was the Indonesian police and other security forces. At the end of the rally some members of the crowd raised the United Nations flag, the Indonesian flag, an SOS flag saying Papuan people are in danger and the banned 'Morning Star' flag, regarded by Indonesian authorities as a symbol of the Papuan separatist movement.
http://www.amnesty.org.nz/archived_news/Indonesia%3Ano-progress-by-police-investigation-into-killing-of-peaceful-papuan-protester+
Low-Level Dialogue Between Papuans and Indonesian Government Officials
At an August 20 meeting between Papuan leaders and Indonesian government officials Papuans sought to explain Papuans' continuing quest for independence in the face of years of inadequately implemented "special autonomy."
Papuans urged the central government officials to cease simply "stigmatizing" Papuans as "separatists" and instead begin to seek out "the root of the problem."
Papuans described the growing social gap between state officials and Papuans at the grassroots level since the implementation of special autonomy. One Papuan leader explained that "Special autonomy funds have been distributed to Papuans, but officials are the only ones who have benefited from them. We don't know where the funds have gone to, but we can see that officials are getting richer, their homes are becoming more lavish and some own three private cars."
The central government officials were mid-level officials included Home Ministry's Sociopolitical Affairs Director General, Ahmad Tanribali Lamo, deputy at the Coordinating Ministry for Political, Legal and Security Affairs, Maj. Gen. Karseno, and director of conflict mitigation at the Sociopolitical Affairs Directorate General, Sr. Comr. Widiyanto. The officials pledged to convey the Papuans' concerns to the Home Minister.
The meeting was an unusual, positive example of dialogue between the central government and Papuans. It represented at best a small step in the direction of the growing Papuan demand, backed by the community, for a senior level, ly mediated dialogue between the Indonesian Government and Papuans.
Call for End to Impunity in West Papua at Conference in Dili
At an conference in Dili to mark the tenth anniversary of Timor-Leste's independence referendum from Indonesia, organizations from 18 countries called for an end to impunity for the perpetrators of the killings of Papuan political leaders and human rights activists. The more than 200 people from solidarity groups, including a majority of Timorese from civil society organizations, sought to develop proposals to address issues of concern in West Papua and elsewhere.
The conference highlighted the need for accountability for security forces involved in the killings of Papuan leaders and activists - including Arnold Ap, Opinus Tabuni and Theys Eluay. The participants urged a peaceful dialogue between the government of Indonesia and representatives of the people of Papua. The conferees also urged Jakarta to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the implementation of Special Autonomy in Papua region and open its results to public. The conference also demanded the release of all Papuan political prisoners.
See also http://www.laohamutuk.org/solidarity/ConfStmt.htm
Addressing the Moribund "Special Autonomy" Policy
An August 29-30 conference convened in West Papua to discuss growing instability and protest in West Papua. At the conference Yusak Yaluwo, a West Papua District chief who led President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's campaign team in Papua for the July presidential election urged the government to pay more attention to West Papua where he said conditions were becoming "more and more precarious."
Yaluwo noted that for Papuans "special autonomy" has not improved economic livelihood, health and education, because a large portion of the program's funding had gone into the pockets of local elites and the bureaucracy, He added that "special autonomy" had generated a "growing social disparity between elites and the common people at grassroots levels.," He concluded that secessionism remained because poverty and marginalization were still major issues. Yaluwo urged President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono form a joint board, composed of representatives of the central government, the two provincial administrations, churches, civil society groups and informal leaders from the Papuan Customary Council (DAP). He proposed that the board over a five year period would seek to "revitalize" special autonomy and evaluate the special autonomy program each year with a focus on "obstacles in its implementation."
He said government representatives on the board would provide feedback to the central government and provincial administrations on what should be done. Yusak also urged provincial authorities to speed up the issuance of special and provincial bylaws to boost development in all sectors in the two provinces.
Meanwhile, Reverend Neles Tebay, a senior official of the Jayapura Archdiocese, spoke against the proposed board noting that West Papua did not lack institutions or agencies and that the key problem was that the government had no political commitment to special autonomy in Papua. "Funding is not the only factor. The government has not shown political commitment to issuing special and provincial bylaws to bring about special autonomy," he said. No grand designs have been made on what should be achieved in the short, middle and long terms under special autonomy. With the lack of supervision, local elites have been free to enrich themselves and their groups, he said.
Prominent NGO's Join Forces to Protect "Bird's Head" Region
Conservation -Indonesia, The Nature Conservancy and WWF-Indonesia have joined forces to establish a "joint-secretariat" for the "Bird's Head Seascape." The collaboration is meant to protect a region which spans the area from Cenderawasih Bay in the east, Raja Ampat in the west to Fakfak in the south. According to a recent study by Conservation Indonesia, the area has 1,511 species of fish and 600 types of reefs and newly discovered endemic reefs.
For many years reefs and fish populations in Papuan waters have been severely damaged by unlicensed fishing operations which operate despite or in collusion with Indonesian security forces in the area charged with protecting those waters.
Source:http://etan.org/issues/wpapua/0909wpap.htm
This is the 64th in a series of monthly reports that focus on developments affecting Papuans. This series is produced by the non-profit West Papua Advocacy Team (WPAT) drawing on media accounts, other NGO assessments, and analysis and reporting from sources within West Papua. This report is co-published with the East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) Back issues are posted online at http://etan.org/issues/wpapua/default.htm Questions regarding this report can be addressed to Edmund McWilliams at edmcw@msn.com.
Summary:
There were Indonesian security force attacks on Papuan civilians in August with reports of continuing assaults in Puncak Jaya and a new report from Yapen island where security forces terrorized villagers following security force murder of a tribal leader and former political prisoner. Amnesty -recognized prisoner of conscience Filep Karma has been hospitalized after a week's delay in medical attention at the notorious Abepura prison. The Australian Senate has called for a return of the Committee of the Red Cross to West Papua after Indonesian officials closed its offices there in the wake of an ICRC visit to Abepura prison this Spring. Despite the jailing of several Papuans alleged to have been behind July attacks in the area of the Freeport mining concession, attacks continued in August. Amnesty has issued a public statement decrying the lack of progress in the investigation of the murder of Papuan activist Opinus Tabuni. Officials of the Home Affairs Ministry have met with Papuans in a rare dialogue. The discussion falls far short of the senior-level, ly mediated dialogue that Papuans have been seeking for several years. More than a dozen organizations meeting in Dili have urged an end to impunity for Indonesian security forces operating in West Papua and for a positive Jakarta response to Papuan calls for dialogue. Senior Papuans, in a late August conference, have emphasized the failure of "special autonomy" to address Papuan needs. Conservation groups have joined together to create a protected region in the waters off West Papua's "bird's head" region.
Contents
Security Forces Burn Homes and Churches in Puncak Jaya Region and Terrorize Civilians in Yapen Island
Inadequate Medical Response to Illness of Papuan Prisoner of Conscience
Australian Government Voices Concern Over Banning of ICRC in West Papua
Attacks on Freeport Vehicles Continue in August Despite July Arrests
Amnesty Statement Decries Lack of Progress in Investigation of Murdered Peaceful Papuan Protester
Low-Level Dialogue Between Papuans and Indonesian Government Officials
At Conference in Dili Call for End to Impunity in West Papua
Addressing the Moribund "Special Autonomy" Policy
Prominent NGO's Join Forces to Protect "Bird's Head" Region
Indonesian Military Forces Burn Homes and Churches in Puncak Jaya Region and in Yapen Island
Papuan sources are reporting Indonesian military attacks on civilians in remote regions of West Papua. These include continued attacks in the long-troubled Puncak Jaya region and reports of new attacks on Yapen island. The remoteness of these regions and Indonesian government restrictions on access by journalists and human rights officials generally in West Papua delays and limits the flow of information on these incidents. The following is known:
Indonesian military forces (TNI) on August 28 conducted a joint operation in Kalome village, Tingginambut district, Puncak Jaya regency. The Indonesian troops burned all the villages honay (traditional round houses) and two churches. The civilian casualty count resulting from this action is as yet not known. (See the June issue of the West Papua report for additional reporting regarding marauding Indonesian-military led "sweep" operations now ongoing in West Papua's central highlands region of Puncak Jaya.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The remoteness of these regions and Indonesian government restrictions on access by journalists and human rights officials generally in West Papua delays and limits the flow of information on these incidents.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In recent months various sources have reported on tension in the area. Much of the tension arises from a rivalry between TNI personnel and the police which run or extort local businesses. Kopassus (Indonesian special forces), Kodim (regional command) and Brimob (the militarized police) are behind most of businesses in Tingginambut. Local people must pay high fees imposed by local security forces for essentials. In addition, there are huge illegal mining activities in the region which are run by or in collaboration with government security forces. Earlier this year a Brimob officer was shot to death in Tingginambut. Many observers doubted the official version that the armed Papuan opposition was responsible for the killing, suspecting instead that the killers were Brimob rivals from Kopassus.
In a second report, two sources on Yapen Island have reported that following the murder of Yawan Wayeni, a tribal leader and nine-year political prisoner during the Suharto dictatorship, in his house in Mantembu village. Following the August 2 murder of Wayeni by Brimob forces, Indonesian forces, on August 3, conducted what the troops described as a "shooting practice" in Mantembu, terrorizing villagers, mostly farmers. Reports claimed that soldiers arrived aboard two trucks several jeeps and dozens of motorcycles.
Yapen police chief Imam Setiawan said that his men had to shoot Yawan Wayeni because he was armed. "We had to shoot first after which we evacuated him to the hospital. He died during the trip to a local hospital. He was shot in the thigh and stomach," said Setiawan as quoted by the Cenderawasih Pos daily. Setiawan claimed that his men had seized a hand-made gun.
Travel to Yapen entails an eight-hour ferry ride from Biak Island. Biak itself is about one hour by air from Jayapura, the capital of Papua.
Inadequate Medical Response to Illness of Papuan Prisoner of Conscience
Filep Karma who is serving his sentence in the Abepura Prison in August was placed in the intensive care ward at the Dok Dua Hospital in Jayapura. After suffering intense abdominal pain for over one week he was finally transferred from the Abepura prison to the hospital on August 18. The transfer took place only after local a facebook and SMS campaign regarding his serious and deteriorating condition.
Karma, a West Papuan, was sentenced in 2008 to 15 years in prison for participation in a rally where the West Papuan national flag, the Morning Star was raised. That ceremony was a peaceful exercise of the right to freedom of expression. Amnesty and other human rights organizations regard Karma among the dozens of Papuan prisoners of conscience now in Indonesian custody. His case, and that of fellow prisoner of conscience Yusuf Pakage, was the subject of a U.S. Congressional letter to President Yudhoyono that was signed by 40 members of the U.S. Congress in 2008.
A Human Rights Watch report in June (see West Papua Report for July) reported on the abuse of prisoners in the Abepura Prison in West Papua. Its June 5 report, "Indonesia: Stop Prison Brutality in Papua," called on the Indonesian Government to "investigate and hold accountable abusive guards and officials at the Abepura prison in Papua." According to the report, "sources report that torture, beatings, and mistreatment by guards are rampant." HRW also noted that among the approximately 230 prisoners at the facility, "more than a dozen are imprisoned for peaceful political acts." In 2007, a United Nations special report also focused on abuse in Indonesian detention and noted particular serious abuse in facilities located in West Papua. In early 2009, Indonesian authorities ordered the Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to close its office in West Papua. The order followed an ICRC visit to prisoners in the Abepura prison.
Indonesian authorities resistance to concern about conditions in detention facilities in West Papua continues. On August 21 the Indonesian Foreign Affairs Ministry issued a statement that rejected calls for a restoration of the West Papua office of the Committee of the Red Cross. The previous Red Cross office was forced to shut and leave West Papua earlier this year after its staff members visited prisoners in jail in West Papua.
Australian Government Voices Concern Over Banning of ICRC in West Papua
An August 21 Radio Australia report noted that Australia's government has sent a quiet signal to Indonesia about mounting concern over human rights conditions in West Papua. The Rudd government -- facing accusations it's too quite on the issue - has allowed its Senators to support a motion in Parliament's upper house that calls for pressure from Canberra on Indonesia to allow the return of the Red Cross to West Papua.
The motion calls on the Australian government to urge Indonesia to allow the Red Cross full and unfettered access in West Papua. The Red Cross was forced to leave Papua in April after it made visits to jailed Papuan separatists. Indonesia claims the Red Cross operation in Papua breached its agreement with Jakarta. The Red Cross claims discussions with the Indonesian government are ongoing.
Attacks on Freeport Vehicles Continue in August Despite July Arrests
Despite the arrest of seven Papuans alleged to be behind the mid July attacks on Freeport personnel traveling on the Timika-Tembagapura road, attacks along that road have continued. (The 79 mile route connects the seaport town of Timika to Freeport's Grassberg mine complex.) On August 12 an employee bus was attacked. No one was injured or died as a result of this incident. On August 16 a convoy of Freeport's buses was attacked despite a police/military escort. Six employees were injured in this incident. On August 26, unknown persons cut the Freeport mine pipe at Mile 63 on the route. On August 28, a gun battle took place between Brimob personnel and an unknown group at Mile 41. Military and police personnel exchanged fire for about five to ten minutes at mile 42 -- 42 along the main road connecting Timika and Tembagapura. The shooting was sparked by gunfire at a bus carrying workers from security post at mile 50 to Timika.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The four-decade old Freeport mining complex has long been the source of protest among Papuans who have seen mine-related devastation
of their environment and displacement of Papuans from their homes. Indonesian security forces paid by Freeport have regularly violated the human rights of local Papuans.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On August 27 a Tempo Interactive report noted that Freeport would henceforth provide an armored vehicle accompaniment for convoys operating within the mine concession territory and that Freeport drivers would be provided with bullet proof vests and helmets. The Freeport action came in response to demands by drivers for better protection.
The August developments have added mystery to the tense environment surrounding the U.S.-based Freeport operation, the largest copper and gold mine in the world. The four-decade old mining complex has long been the source of protest among Papuans who have seen mine-related devastation
of their environment and displacement of Papuans from their homes. Indonesian security forces paid by Freeport have regularly violated the human rights of local Papuans.
The August attacks also raise a fundamental question of justice regarding those Papuans jailed for the July attacks. Charges against them in July appear to be refuted by the continuing attacks in August.
In late August, the TNI announced that 600 military personnel would take up security duties for the Freeport facility beginning September 2. Many analysts had speculated that the July-August shootings in the vicinity of the Freeport concession may have had the goal of creating instability with the ultimate intention of re-establishing TNI's lead role for provision of security in the area, a role that had been highly lucrative for the TNI over several decades.
Amnesty Statement Decries Lack of Progress in Investigation of Murdered Peaceful Papuan Protester
An August 11 Public statement by Amnesty decried the failure of Indonesian officials to make progress in the investigation of the killing of Papuan protester Opinus Tabuni, one year after the incident. The statement noted that the absence of progress in the investigation underscored the continued lack of accountability in cases involving the lethal use of firearms by law enforcement officials.
Opinus Tabuni, aged 35, was part of a peaceful rally celebrating United Nations Indigenous People's Day on 9 August 2008 in Wamena, West Papua. Also present was the Indonesian police and other security forces. At the end of the rally some members of the crowd raised the United Nations flag, the Indonesian flag, an SOS flag saying Papuan people are in danger and the banned 'Morning Star' flag, regarded by Indonesian authorities as a symbol of the Papuan separatist movement.
http://www.amnesty.org.nz/archived_news/Indonesia%3Ano-progress-by-police-investigation-into-killing-of-peaceful-papuan-protester+
Low-Level Dialogue Between Papuans and Indonesian Government Officials
At an August 20 meeting between Papuan leaders and Indonesian government officials Papuans sought to explain Papuans' continuing quest for independence in the face of years of inadequately implemented "special autonomy."
Papuans urged the central government officials to cease simply "stigmatizing" Papuans as "separatists" and instead begin to seek out "the root of the problem."
Papuans described the growing social gap between state officials and Papuans at the grassroots level since the implementation of special autonomy. One Papuan leader explained that "Special autonomy funds have been distributed to Papuans, but officials are the only ones who have benefited from them. We don't know where the funds have gone to, but we can see that officials are getting richer, their homes are becoming more lavish and some own three private cars."
The central government officials were mid-level officials included Home Ministry's Sociopolitical Affairs Director General, Ahmad Tanribali Lamo, deputy at the Coordinating Ministry for Political, Legal and Security Affairs, Maj. Gen. Karseno, and director of conflict mitigation at the Sociopolitical Affairs Directorate General, Sr. Comr. Widiyanto. The officials pledged to convey the Papuans' concerns to the Home Minister.
The meeting was an unusual, positive example of dialogue between the central government and Papuans. It represented at best a small step in the direction of the growing Papuan demand, backed by the community, for a senior level, ly mediated dialogue between the Indonesian Government and Papuans.
Call for End to Impunity in West Papua at Conference in Dili
At an conference in Dili to mark the tenth anniversary of Timor-Leste's independence referendum from Indonesia, organizations from 18 countries called for an end to impunity for the perpetrators of the killings of Papuan political leaders and human rights activists. The more than 200 people from solidarity groups, including a majority of Timorese from civil society organizations, sought to develop proposals to address issues of concern in West Papua and elsewhere.
The conference highlighted the need for accountability for security forces involved in the killings of Papuan leaders and activists - including Arnold Ap, Opinus Tabuni and Theys Eluay. The participants urged a peaceful dialogue between the government of Indonesia and representatives of the people of Papua. The conferees also urged Jakarta to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the implementation of Special Autonomy in Papua region and open its results to public. The conference also demanded the release of all Papuan political prisoners.
See also http://www.laohamutuk.org/solidarity/ConfStmt.htm
Addressing the Moribund "Special Autonomy" Policy
An August 29-30 conference convened in West Papua to discuss growing instability and protest in West Papua. At the conference Yusak Yaluwo, a West Papua District chief who led President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's campaign team in Papua for the July presidential election urged the government to pay more attention to West Papua where he said conditions were becoming "more and more precarious."
Yaluwo noted that for Papuans "special autonomy" has not improved economic livelihood, health and education, because a large portion of the program's funding had gone into the pockets of local elites and the bureaucracy, He added that "special autonomy" had generated a "growing social disparity between elites and the common people at grassroots levels.," He concluded that secessionism remained because poverty and marginalization were still major issues. Yaluwo urged President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono form a joint board, composed of representatives of the central government, the two provincial administrations, churches, civil society groups and informal leaders from the Papuan Customary Council (DAP). He proposed that the board over a five year period would seek to "revitalize" special autonomy and evaluate the special autonomy program each year with a focus on "obstacles in its implementation."
He said government representatives on the board would provide feedback to the central government and provincial administrations on what should be done. Yusak also urged provincial authorities to speed up the issuance of special and provincial bylaws to boost development in all sectors in the two provinces.
Meanwhile, Reverend Neles Tebay, a senior official of the Jayapura Archdiocese, spoke against the proposed board noting that West Papua did not lack institutions or agencies and that the key problem was that the government had no political commitment to special autonomy in Papua. "Funding is not the only factor. The government has not shown political commitment to issuing special and provincial bylaws to bring about special autonomy," he said. No grand designs have been made on what should be achieved in the short, middle and long terms under special autonomy. With the lack of supervision, local elites have been free to enrich themselves and their groups, he said.
Prominent NGO's Join Forces to Protect "Bird's Head" Region
Conservation -Indonesia, The Nature Conservancy and WWF-Indonesia have joined forces to establish a "joint-secretariat" for the "Bird's Head Seascape." The collaboration is meant to protect a region which spans the area from Cenderawasih Bay in the east, Raja Ampat in the west to Fakfak in the south. According to a recent study by Conservation Indonesia, the area has 1,511 species of fish and 600 types of reefs and newly discovered endemic reefs.
For many years reefs and fish populations in Papuan waters have been severely damaged by unlicensed fishing operations which operate despite or in collusion with Indonesian security forces in the area charged with protecting those waters.
Source:http://etan.org/issues/wpapua/0909wpap.htm
Sunday 26 July 2009
Freeport's Workers Again Under Attack In Indonesia
More Shooting On Road To Freeport's Indonesian Gold Mine; 3 Wounded
(AP) Three more people were wounded by gunfire Wednesday at the world's largest gold mine, the latest ambush targeting employees of U.S. conglomerate Freeport in Indonesia's underdeveloped Papua province.
It is the sixth attack by unidentified gunman on the Phoenix, Ariz.-based company in under two weeks, and marks the worst violence at Freeport since the 2002 killing of three schoolteachers, including two Americans.
The unrest _ which has killed two people and wounded dozens since the shootings began July 11 _ also comes as Indonesia recovers from twin suicide bombings in the capital, Jakarta, last Friday, that killed seven people and wounded dozens, including two Freeport executives.
Freeport said in a statement that several employees and their security detail were fired upon Wednesday while driving along the road where the previous shootings occurred to help a broken down vehicle. A mechanic and two policemen were shot, it said.
National police spokesman Nanan Sukarna said the attack was carried out by unidentified gunmen and that the three injuries were caused by shrapnel. The culprits escaped.
Two other policemen died Wednesday when their car flipped "while driving at high speed through a dangerous area" a few miles (kilometers) away, said local police chief Lt. Col. Godhelp Mansnembra.
Freeport, citing the police, said the incidents did not appear to be related.
Wednesday's attack comes a day after authorities said they rounded up 15 suspects allegedly behind the recent killings. Freeport CEO Richard Adkerson said Tuesday that six of them had been charged, including a man who apparently acknowledged being a sniper.
"We have been assured from the highest levels of government in Indonesia they are committed to provide safety for our people and for our operations," Adkerson said in a conference call detailing the company's latest earnings.
The violence is an unwelcome surprise for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who is firmly on track to win a landslide victory that will put him in office until 2014, partly thanks to his good reputation in combating Islamist militancy.
The Antara state news agency initially reported that Wednesday's shooting targeted a convoy of 12 buses returning hundreds of employees who have been unable to return to work. The road targeted by the shootings links the Grasberg mining complex and the town of Timika, and has been declared off limits unless employees travel with security.
A PT Freeport spokesman in Indonesia, Mindo Pangaribuan, said early Wednesday that "secure transportations have been arranged to transport personnel and deliver supplies." The buses were turned back because of the gunfire, but Freeport said in its statement that no shots were fired at the bus convoy.
Papua is home to a four-decade-old, low-level insurgency against the government, and members of the Free Papua Movement _ who see Freeport as a symbol of outside rule _ were initially blamed by authorities for the latest violence.
However, some experts believe the shootings resulted from a rivalry between the police and military over multimillion-dollar illegal gold mining or protection businesses at the mine. Others blame criminal gangs.
It is difficult to get accurate information out of Papua, a remote and highly militarized area that is off limits to foreign journalists.
Freeport has been targeted with arson, roadside bombs and blockades since production began in the 1970s during the U.S.-backed Suharto dictatorship. It is also regularly the focus of protests by local residents who feel they are not benefiting from the depletion of Papua's natural resources.
The recent shootings that began earlier this month have killed an Australian mining expert and a contract security guard. More than a dozen others have also been hit by bullets.
Papua, a desperately poor mountain province, lies on the western half of New uinea island, some 2,100 miles (3,400 kilometers) east of the capital, Jakarta. Formerly known as West Papua, the territory with a population of around 2.5 million was transferred from Dutch to Indonesian rule in the 1960s after a U.N. sponsored vote by community leaders that has been widely dismissed by academics as a sham.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/07/24/ap/asia/main5187761.shtml
(AP) Three more people were wounded by gunfire Wednesday at the world's largest gold mine, the latest ambush targeting employees of U.S. conglomerate Freeport in Indonesia's underdeveloped Papua province.
It is the sixth attack by unidentified gunman on the Phoenix, Ariz.-based company in under two weeks, and marks the worst violence at Freeport since the 2002 killing of three schoolteachers, including two Americans.
The unrest _ which has killed two people and wounded dozens since the shootings began July 11 _ also comes as Indonesia recovers from twin suicide bombings in the capital, Jakarta, last Friday, that killed seven people and wounded dozens, including two Freeport executives.
Freeport said in a statement that several employees and their security detail were fired upon Wednesday while driving along the road where the previous shootings occurred to help a broken down vehicle. A mechanic and two policemen were shot, it said.
National police spokesman Nanan Sukarna said the attack was carried out by unidentified gunmen and that the three injuries were caused by shrapnel. The culprits escaped.
Two other policemen died Wednesday when their car flipped "while driving at high speed through a dangerous area" a few miles (kilometers) away, said local police chief Lt. Col. Godhelp Mansnembra.
Freeport, citing the police, said the incidents did not appear to be related.
Wednesday's attack comes a day after authorities said they rounded up 15 suspects allegedly behind the recent killings. Freeport CEO Richard Adkerson said Tuesday that six of them had been charged, including a man who apparently acknowledged being a sniper.
"We have been assured from the highest levels of government in Indonesia they are committed to provide safety for our people and for our operations," Adkerson said in a conference call detailing the company's latest earnings.
The violence is an unwelcome surprise for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who is firmly on track to win a landslide victory that will put him in office until 2014, partly thanks to his good reputation in combating Islamist militancy.
The Antara state news agency initially reported that Wednesday's shooting targeted a convoy of 12 buses returning hundreds of employees who have been unable to return to work. The road targeted by the shootings links the Grasberg mining complex and the town of Timika, and has been declared off limits unless employees travel with security.
A PT Freeport spokesman in Indonesia, Mindo Pangaribuan, said early Wednesday that "secure transportations have been arranged to transport personnel and deliver supplies." The buses were turned back because of the gunfire, but Freeport said in its statement that no shots were fired at the bus convoy.
Papua is home to a four-decade-old, low-level insurgency against the government, and members of the Free Papua Movement _ who see Freeport as a symbol of outside rule _ were initially blamed by authorities for the latest violence.
However, some experts believe the shootings resulted from a rivalry between the police and military over multimillion-dollar illegal gold mining or protection businesses at the mine. Others blame criminal gangs.
It is difficult to get accurate information out of Papua, a remote and highly militarized area that is off limits to foreign journalists.
Freeport has been targeted with arson, roadside bombs and blockades since production began in the 1970s during the U.S.-backed Suharto dictatorship. It is also regularly the focus of protests by local residents who feel they are not benefiting from the depletion of Papua's natural resources.
The recent shootings that began earlier this month have killed an Australian mining expert and a contract security guard. More than a dozen others have also been hit by bullets.
Papua, a desperately poor mountain province, lies on the western half of New uinea island, some 2,100 miles (3,400 kilometers) east of the capital, Jakarta. Formerly known as West Papua, the territory with a population of around 2.5 million was transferred from Dutch to Indonesian rule in the 1960s after a U.N. sponsored vote by community leaders that has been widely dismissed by academics as a sham.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/07/24/ap/asia/main5187761.shtml
West Papua: Indonesian impunity at Freeport mine
25 July 2009
The article below is abridged from a July 23 statement by the West Papua Advocacy Team.
Amid an ongoing shooting spree at the Freeport McMoRan mining concession in Timika, West Papua, four people have died, including an Australian Freeport employee.
Six separate ambushes have taken place since shootings began on July 11.
A race to find scapegoats appears underway. Indonesian authorities have arrested as many as 20 individuals.
Trusted sources informed the West Papua Advocacy Team that these detainees had been interrogated without the presence of their lawyers and at least one, an elderly man, was beaten by security personnel.
Even after these recent detentions, a convoy of 12 Freeport busses again came under attack by gunmen on July 22.
This is just the latest chapter in the Freeport story in West Papua — a saga of violence, human rights violations and internationally condemned environmental destruction.
For decades, in numerous well-documented cases, the Indonesian security forces and Freeport’s own security personnel, have intimidated and repressed local Papuans through extrajudicial killings, torture, rape, and other forms of violence and terror.
Indonesian security forces have long exploited the weakness of the Indonesian judicial system to avoid prosecution for criminal activity. Nowhere is this more true than in West Papua, where the culture of repression lives on beyond former dictator Suharto's 32-year rule, which ended formally in 1998.
The principal victims have been ordinary Papuans, notably those living in the area of the Freeport mine. Indonesian officials and the international community must act to ensure that the people of West Papua are not victimised yet again.
Initial Indonesian police reports suggest that those responsible for the recent attacks were “expert” shooters using weapons commonly found in military and police arsenals. Similar statements were made in 2002, when one Indonesian and two US schoolteachers were killed on the same road.
Ballistic evidence and eye-witness testimony pointed to an Indonesian military role in that ambush, but the Bush administration and Indonesian officials, including recently re-elected President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, orchestrated a cover-up.
Recent history raises grave concerns about finding the truth about this latest incident.
The military has joined the investigation into the latest attacks, making it likely the investigation will again fail to explore evidence pointing to the Indonesian military.
Indonesia and those who lobby for its interests boast of its democratic progress.
This latest incident offers a test of that progress: the investigation of this incident must be transparent; the media and independent human rights investigators should be given access to West Papua and specifically the Freeport Concession; and security forces that have long operated with impunity must be held accountable if evidence emerges implicating them.
In the wake of this tragedy, the Papuan people must not again be subjected to retaliatory military or police action in the form of “sweeps” targeting innocent villagers in the area.
The US government and the international community must reject a military takeover of the investigation, as well as efforts to stonewall independent investigators as happened in 2002.
The US should monitor developments closely to ensure Indonesian forces do not use US equipment in retaliatory “sweep” operations targeting innocent Papuan civilians as in the past.
The Obama administration should focus renewed attention on the still-open FBI investigation into the 2002 killings, following up on published accounts of military involvement in those murders.
From: International News, Green Left Weekly issue #804 29 July 2009.
http://www.greenleft.org.au/2009/804/41390
The article below is abridged from a July 23 statement by the West Papua Advocacy Team.
Amid an ongoing shooting spree at the Freeport McMoRan mining concession in Timika, West Papua, four people have died, including an Australian Freeport employee.
Six separate ambushes have taken place since shootings began on July 11.
A race to find scapegoats appears underway. Indonesian authorities have arrested as many as 20 individuals.
Trusted sources informed the West Papua Advocacy Team that these detainees had been interrogated without the presence of their lawyers and at least one, an elderly man, was beaten by security personnel.
Even after these recent detentions, a convoy of 12 Freeport busses again came under attack by gunmen on July 22.
This is just the latest chapter in the Freeport story in West Papua — a saga of violence, human rights violations and internationally condemned environmental destruction.
For decades, in numerous well-documented cases, the Indonesian security forces and Freeport’s own security personnel, have intimidated and repressed local Papuans through extrajudicial killings, torture, rape, and other forms of violence and terror.
Indonesian security forces have long exploited the weakness of the Indonesian judicial system to avoid prosecution for criminal activity. Nowhere is this more true than in West Papua, where the culture of repression lives on beyond former dictator Suharto's 32-year rule, which ended formally in 1998.
The principal victims have been ordinary Papuans, notably those living in the area of the Freeport mine. Indonesian officials and the international community must act to ensure that the people of West Papua are not victimised yet again.
Initial Indonesian police reports suggest that those responsible for the recent attacks were “expert” shooters using weapons commonly found in military and police arsenals. Similar statements were made in 2002, when one Indonesian and two US schoolteachers were killed on the same road.
Ballistic evidence and eye-witness testimony pointed to an Indonesian military role in that ambush, but the Bush administration and Indonesian officials, including recently re-elected President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, orchestrated a cover-up.
Recent history raises grave concerns about finding the truth about this latest incident.
The military has joined the investigation into the latest attacks, making it likely the investigation will again fail to explore evidence pointing to the Indonesian military.
Indonesia and those who lobby for its interests boast of its democratic progress.
This latest incident offers a test of that progress: the investigation of this incident must be transparent; the media and independent human rights investigators should be given access to West Papua and specifically the Freeport Concession; and security forces that have long operated with impunity must be held accountable if evidence emerges implicating them.
In the wake of this tragedy, the Papuan people must not again be subjected to retaliatory military or police action in the form of “sweeps” targeting innocent villagers in the area.
The US government and the international community must reject a military takeover of the investigation, as well as efforts to stonewall independent investigators as happened in 2002.
The US should monitor developments closely to ensure Indonesian forces do not use US equipment in retaliatory “sweep” operations targeting innocent Papuan civilians as in the past.
The Obama administration should focus renewed attention on the still-open FBI investigation into the 2002 killings, following up on published accounts of military involvement in those murders.
From: International News, Green Left Weekly issue #804 29 July 2009.
http://www.greenleft.org.au/2009/804/41390
Papuans Face Charges For Peaceful Demonstration
Sunday, 26 July 2009, 3:45 pm
Press Release: West Papua Media Alerts
15 Papuans Face Serious Charges For Peaceful Demonstration 24 July 2009
The trial of fifteen Papuans, facing the charge of makar, was resumed yesterday in Nabire District Court. The accused, all men, are mostly students and farmers associated with the West Papua National Committee, an organisation that seeks independence from Indonesia.
The men were arrested on 6 April, after attending a pre-election rally and have been charged under Article 106 of the Criminal Code which carries a maximum penalty of twenty years for treason or subversion (makar).
Many Papuans are now serving heavy sentences after being found guilty of makar, simply for raising the Morning Star flag. Among them are Filep Karma and Yusak Pakage, now serving sentences of fifteen and ten years respectively for raising a Morning Star flag in 2004. Earlier this month, Filep Karma was hospitalised after suffering respiratory problems.
The trial of the fifteen has been dogged since it commenced on 18 June by disputes between the judges and the defence team. Last week, the judges dismissed the defence counsel's complaint that the arrests did not conform with legal procedures. The lawyers also said that the men had not been given access to legal representation nor had they been given police documents relating to the charges until they appeared in court. Nor had those among the fifteen who do not speak Indonesian be given interpreters when questioned by the police.
TAPOL believes that criminalising the fifteen men who have been engaged in legitimate and peaceful activities is a violation of their rights to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly. Carmel Budiardjo of TAPOL said: 'There is no justification to charge these men with makar, which could result in their being sentenced to long terms of imprisonment. The charges should be dropped and the men released.'
TAPOL also draws attention to other Papuans who have been arrested since October 2009 and faced with the charge of makar. Among them is Buchtar Tabuni who was arrested in December last year for organising a demonstration on 16 October that was held to welcome the launch in London of International Parliamentarians for West Papua. Initially charged with makar, Buchtar was sentenced to three years on 3 July for provocation, after the judge decided to drop the charge of makar.
The trial of another Papuan, Seby Sambom who was arrested along with Buchtar Tabuni, is still in progress. He too is being charged with makar. Earlier this week, TAPOL received a message from Seby, stressing the need for international support. His message which was headed 'Please Protect Us!', called among other things for Freedom from Torture and Maltreatment and Freedom to Fight for Human Rights and Against Discrimination.
Earlier this week, the Indonesian Government pushed for the establishment of a regional Inter-Governmental Commission on Human Rights at a meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers, thus establishing its reputation as an advocate for rights codified in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
However, despite there good intentions, Papuans are being criminalised for peaceful acts in support of freedom of expression. In 2007, a presidential regulation, PP No, 77, was enacted, making it a criminal offence for the Morning Star flag and the local flag in Maluku to be unfurled.
According to TAPOL, such contradictory actions suggest that while seeking to impress the international community regarding its commitment to upholding basic human rights, the Indonesian judicial system is subjecting Indonesian citizens in Papua to heavy-handed treatment in violation of international covenants that have won the support of the government. Moreover, Indonesia secured a seat in the UN Human Rights Council in 2006, further enhancing its international reputation.
TAPOL calls for an end to continuing violations of basic human rights in Papua. The Indonesian Government should make it crystal clear that these violations must stop. It also calls for the revocation of PP 77/2007. 'If Indonesia wants to be accepted worldwide as a country that respects basic human rights, it should stop levelling charges of makar against people involved in peaceful acts of expression in Papua, Maluku or anywhere else,' said Carmel Budiardjo of TAPOL.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO0907/S00438.htm
Press Release: West Papua Media Alerts
15 Papuans Face Serious Charges For Peaceful Demonstration 24 July 2009
The trial of fifteen Papuans, facing the charge of makar, was resumed yesterday in Nabire District Court. The accused, all men, are mostly students and farmers associated with the West Papua National Committee, an organisation that seeks independence from Indonesia.
The men were arrested on 6 April, after attending a pre-election rally and have been charged under Article 106 of the Criminal Code which carries a maximum penalty of twenty years for treason or subversion (makar).
Many Papuans are now serving heavy sentences after being found guilty of makar, simply for raising the Morning Star flag. Among them are Filep Karma and Yusak Pakage, now serving sentences of fifteen and ten years respectively for raising a Morning Star flag in 2004. Earlier this month, Filep Karma was hospitalised after suffering respiratory problems.
The trial of the fifteen has been dogged since it commenced on 18 June by disputes between the judges and the defence team. Last week, the judges dismissed the defence counsel's complaint that the arrests did not conform with legal procedures. The lawyers also said that the men had not been given access to legal representation nor had they been given police documents relating to the charges until they appeared in court. Nor had those among the fifteen who do not speak Indonesian be given interpreters when questioned by the police.
TAPOL believes that criminalising the fifteen men who have been engaged in legitimate and peaceful activities is a violation of their rights to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly. Carmel Budiardjo of TAPOL said: 'There is no justification to charge these men with makar, which could result in their being sentenced to long terms of imprisonment. The charges should be dropped and the men released.'
TAPOL also draws attention to other Papuans who have been arrested since October 2009 and faced with the charge of makar. Among them is Buchtar Tabuni who was arrested in December last year for organising a demonstration on 16 October that was held to welcome the launch in London of International Parliamentarians for West Papua. Initially charged with makar, Buchtar was sentenced to three years on 3 July for provocation, after the judge decided to drop the charge of makar.
The trial of another Papuan, Seby Sambom who was arrested along with Buchtar Tabuni, is still in progress. He too is being charged with makar. Earlier this week, TAPOL received a message from Seby, stressing the need for international support. His message which was headed 'Please Protect Us!', called among other things for Freedom from Torture and Maltreatment and Freedom to Fight for Human Rights and Against Discrimination.
Earlier this week, the Indonesian Government pushed for the establishment of a regional Inter-Governmental Commission on Human Rights at a meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers, thus establishing its reputation as an advocate for rights codified in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
However, despite there good intentions, Papuans are being criminalised for peaceful acts in support of freedom of expression. In 2007, a presidential regulation, PP No, 77, was enacted, making it a criminal offence for the Morning Star flag and the local flag in Maluku to be unfurled.
According to TAPOL, such contradictory actions suggest that while seeking to impress the international community regarding its commitment to upholding basic human rights, the Indonesian judicial system is subjecting Indonesian citizens in Papua to heavy-handed treatment in violation of international covenants that have won the support of the government. Moreover, Indonesia secured a seat in the UN Human Rights Council in 2006, further enhancing its international reputation.
TAPOL calls for an end to continuing violations of basic human rights in Papua. The Indonesian Government should make it crystal clear that these violations must stop. It also calls for the revocation of PP 77/2007. 'If Indonesia wants to be accepted worldwide as a country that respects basic human rights, it should stop levelling charges of makar against people involved in peaceful acts of expression in Papua, Maluku or anywhere else,' said Carmel Budiardjo of TAPOL.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO0907/S00438.htm
Saturday 25 July 2009
CHRONOLOGY OF THE ARREST OF 9 CIVILIANS AND AN ALTERNATIVE SOLUTION TO REVEAL THE ACTOR OF THE SHOOTING INCIDENT AT MILE 58 TEMBAGAPURA TIMIKA
By Markus Haluk
A recent shooting incident; Drew Nicholas Grant, an Australian national who worked for PT Freeport, was shot dead by unknown people at Mile-52 on Saturday (July 11 at 5.00am). Drew was with Mr Lucan Jhon Biggs (driver) and Maju Pandjaitan in a Toyota land Cruiser (reg.no: 01-2578). They were on their way from Tembagapura to Timika.
Following the incident, several personnel of mobile brigade from Amole 2 were shot on the 12 to 13 July 2009. These incidents attracted lots of attention from various leaders of Indonesian state institutions, NGOs, Churches within the country and overseas. Secretary of the ministry for security and political affairs, high ranking officials from Indonesian military and state police headquarters, for instance, have visited (Timika) West Papua. After the visit, 700 organic and non-organic personnel from Indonesian military and state police were sent to the area to begin the joint military and police sweeping operations at the PT Freeport Indonesia area.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation, however, did not take place at the PT Freeport Indonesia area but at Timika town and the target of the operation was the ordinary civilians. In a brutal sweeping operation , the Indonesian military and police arrested 7 civilians in the middle of Timika town.
The arrest took place at 15:00 on July 20, 2009. These civilians were just ordinary people who were doing their daily activities in Timika town. Their names are as follows:
No. Name Age Tribe of origin
01. Piter Beanal 70 years Amungme Head of tribe
02. Janes Uanman 68 years Amungme Community leader
03. Tomi Beanal 20 years Amunme Youth
04. Eltinus Beanal 19 years Amungme Youth
05. Simon Jawame 38 years Amungme Father of a family
06. Domininggus Beanal 25 years Amungme Youth
07. Jaring beanal 16 years Amungme Child
08. Samuel Toffly 29 years Key Youth
09. Petrus Kanisius Luther 40 years Tanimbar Father of a family
Eyewitness informed us that the military sweeping operations were conducted on the streets, public places and inside family homes.
Besides, the Indonesian security brutally destroyed Demianus Beanal’s house. Demianus who worked for PT Freeport Indonesia lived at Jln Paulus Magal, RT. 04 Kwamki Baru. Many other civilians were beaten, kicked and tortured by the Indonesian military. They used the weapon handles to beat the civilians.
The brutal sweeping operation and arrests of the civilians caused fear and traumatic experience. Many people who had experienced similar brutality in the past now have fled and escaped to the jungles.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation did not respect the Amungsa people’s human dignity and it was conducted unlawfully (not according to the Indonesian law). We regret that the operation was not conducted professionally. We believe that by using the violent approach, the Indonesian security forces will not be able to reveal the actor behind the shooting of the Australian worker. In addition, the security forces have made a propaganda to change the public opinions of the conflict by arresting, terrorising, and intimidating innocent civilians. This repeats the same shooting incident at Mile 62-63 Tembagapura Timika in 2002 that caused the arrest of ordinary civilians such as Revd. Isak Ondowame and others.
In order to avoid the propaganda and to reveal the actor who shot Mr Drew Grant (38) and others, and to avoid the arrest of civilians in Timika West Papua, we propose the following recommendations:
1. We urge the Australian government to immediately send Australian Federal Police to do a depth investigation of the shooting of Mr Drew grant. This investigation is conducted independently from the Indonesian state police investigation.
2. We urge the Indonesian state police especially the regional police in Papua to conduct the investigation professionally and avoid destroying people’s houses and arresting the civilians.
3. We urge the regional police of Papua to immediately release 9 civilians who are in Timika Police custody. Their arrests can worsen the security situation in Timika.
4. We urge the security forces to stop terrorising and arresting civilians in Timika West Papua.
5. We urge the National Commission on human rights to form an independent team consisting of other independent organisations to investigate the shooting incident.
6. We urge President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to stop sending troops to Timika West Papua and to promote a respectful and peaceful approach in handling the issue.
7. In order to maintain West Papua as a land of peace, we ask that the Amungsa-Timika people and all the Papuans in West Papua to keep calm and not be easily provoked.
End of the chr
onology of the arrest and some proposed solutions. Thank you for your attention and good cooperation.
Jayapura, 21 July 2009
A recent shooting incident; Drew Nicholas Grant, an Australian national who worked for PT Freeport, was shot dead by unknown people at Mile-52 on Saturday (July 11 at 5.00am). Drew was with Mr Lucan Jhon Biggs (driver) and Maju Pandjaitan in a Toyota land Cruiser (reg.no: 01-2578). They were on their way from Tembagapura to Timika.
Following the incident, several personnel of mobile brigade from Amole 2 were shot on the 12 to 13 July 2009. These incidents attracted lots of attention from various leaders of Indonesian state institutions, NGOs, Churches within the country and overseas. Secretary of the ministry for security and political affairs, high ranking officials from Indonesian military and state police headquarters, for instance, have visited (Timika) West Papua. After the visit, 700 organic and non-organic personnel from Indonesian military and state police were sent to the area to begin the joint military and police sweeping operations at the PT Freeport Indonesia area.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation, however, did not take place at the PT Freeport Indonesia area but at Timika town and the target of the operation was the ordinary civilians. In a brutal sweeping operation , the Indonesian military and police arrested 7 civilians in the middle of Timika town.
The arrest took place at 15:00 on July 20, 2009. These civilians were just ordinary people who were doing their daily activities in Timika town. Their names are as follows:
No. Name Age Tribe of origin
01. Piter Beanal 70 years Amungme Head of tribe
02. Janes Uanman 68 years Amungme Community leader
03. Tomi Beanal 20 years Amunme Youth
04. Eltinus Beanal 19 years Amungme Youth
05. Simon Jawame 38 years Amungme Father of a family
06. Domininggus Beanal 25 years Amungme Youth
07. Jaring beanal 16 years Amungme Child
08. Samuel Toffly 29 years Key Youth
09. Petrus Kanisius Luther 40 years Tanimbar Father of a family
Eyewitness informed us that the military sweeping operations were conducted on the streets, public places and inside family homes.
Besides, the Indonesian security brutally destroyed Demianus Beanal’s house. Demianus who worked for PT Freeport Indonesia lived at Jln Paulus Magal, RT. 04 Kwamki Baru. Many other civilians were beaten, kicked and tortured by the Indonesian military. They used the weapon handles to beat the civilians.
The brutal sweeping operation and arrests of the civilians caused fear and traumatic experience. Many people who had experienced similar brutality in the past now have fled and escaped to the jungles.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation did not respect the Amungsa people’s human dignity and it was conducted unlawfully (not according to the Indonesian law). We regret that the operation was not conducted professionally. We believe that by using the violent approach, the Indonesian security forces will not be able to reveal the actor behind the shooting of the Australian worker. In addition, the security forces have made a propaganda to change the public opinions of the conflict by arresting, terrorising, and intimidating innocent civilians. This repeats the same shooting incident at Mile 62-63 Tembagapura Timika in 2002 that caused the arrest of ordinary civilians such as Revd. Isak Ondowame and others.
In order to avoid the propaganda and to reveal the actor who shot Mr Drew Grant (38) and others, and to avoid the arrest of civilians in Timika West Papua, we propose the following recommendations:
1. We urge the Australian government to immediately send Australian Federal Police to do a depth investigation of the shooting of Mr Drew grant. This investigation is conducted independently from the Indonesian state police investigation.
2. We urge the Indonesian state police especially the regional police in Papua to conduct the investigation professionally and avoid destroying people’s houses and arresting the civilians.
3. We urge the regional police of Papua to immediately release 9 civilians who are in Timika Police custody. Their arrests can worsen the security situation in Timika.
4. We urge the security forces to stop terrorising and arresting civilians in Timika West Papua.
5. We urge the National Commission on human rights to form an independent team consisting of other independent organisations to investigate the shooting incident.
6. We urge President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to stop sending troops to Timika West Papua and to promote a respectful and peaceful approach in handling the issue.
7. In order to maintain West Papua as a land of peace, we ask that the Amungsa-Timika people and all the Papuans in West Papua to keep calm and not be easily provoked.
End of the chr
onology of the arrest and some proposed solutions. Thank you for your attention and good cooperation.
Jayapura, 21 July 2009
CHRONOLOGY OF THE ARREST OF 9 CIVILIANS AND AN ALTERNATIVE SOLUTION TO REVEAL THE ACTOR OF THE SHOOTING INCIDENT AT MILE 58 TEMBAGAPURA TIMIKA
By Markus Haluk
A recent shooting incident; Drew Nicholas Grant, an Australian national who worked for PT Freeport, was shot dead by unknown people at Mile-52 on Saturday (July 11 at 5.00am). Drew was with Mr Lucan Jhon Biggs (driver) and Maju Pandjaitan in a Toyota land Cruiser (reg.no: 01-2578). They were on their way from Tembagapura to Timika.
Following the incident, several personnel of mobile brigade from Amole 2 were shot on the 12 to 13 July 2009. These incidents attracted lots of attention from various leaders of Indonesian state institutions, NGOs, Churches within the country and overseas. Secretary of the ministry for security and political affairs, high ranking officials from Indonesian military and state police headquarters, for instance, have visited (Timika) West Papua. After the visit, 700 organic and non-organic personnel from Indonesian military and state police were sent to the area to begin the joint military and police sweeping operations at the PT Freeport Indonesia area.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation, however, did not take place at the PT Freeport Indonesia area but at Timika town and the target of the operation was the ordinary civilians. In a brutal sweeping operation , the Indonesian military and police arrested 7 civilians in the middle of Timika town.
The arrest took place at 15:00 on July 20, 2009. These civilians were just ordinary people who were doing their daily activities in Timika town. Their names are as follows:
No. Name Age Tribe of origin
01. Piter Beanal 70 years Amungme Head of tribe
02. Janes Uanman 68 years Amungme Community leader
03. Tomi Beanal 20 years Amunme Youth
04. Eltinus Beanal 19 years Amungme Youth
05. Simon Jawame 38 years Amungme Father of a family
06. Domininggus Beanal 25 years Amungme Youth
07. Jaring beanal 16 years Amungme Child
08. Samuel Toffly 29 years Key Youth
09. Petrus Kanisius Luther 40 years Tanimbar Father of a family
Eyewitness informed us that the military sweeping operations were conducted on the streets, public places and inside family homes.
Besides, the Indonesian security brutally destroyed Demianus Beanal’s house. Demianus who worked for PT Freeport Indonesia lived at Jln Paulus Magal, RT. 04 Kwamki Baru. Many other civilians were beaten, kicked and tortured by the Indonesian military. They used the weapon handles to beat the civilians.
The brutal sweeping operation and arrests of the civilians caused fear and traumatic experience. Many people who had experienced similar brutality in the past now have fled and escaped to the jungles.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation did not respect the Amungsa people’s human dignity and it was conducted unlawfully (not according to the Indonesian law). We regret that the operation was not conducted professionally. We believe that by using the violent approach, the Indonesian security forces will not be able to reveal the actor behind the shooting of the Australian worker. In addition, the security forces have made a propaganda to change the public opinions of the conflict by arresting, terrorising, and intimidating innocent civilians. This repeats the same shooting incident at Mile 62-63 Tembagapura Timika in 2002 that caused the arrest of ordinary civilians such as Revd. Isak Ondowame and others.
In order to avoid the propaganda and to reveal the actor who shot Mr Drew Grant (38) and others, and to avoid the arrest of civilians in Timika West Papua, we propose the following recommendations:
1. We urge the Australian government to immediately send Australian Federal Police to do a depth investigation of the shooting of Mr Drew grant. This investigation is conducted independently from the Indonesian state police investigation.
2. We urge the Indonesian state police especially the regional police in Papua to conduct the investigation professionally and avoid destroying people’s houses and arresting the civilians.
3. We urge the regional police of Papua to immediately release 9 civilians who are in Timika Police custody. Their arrests can worsen the security situation in Timika.
4. We urge the security forces to stop terrorising and arresting civilians in Timika West Papua.
5. We urge the National Commission on human rights to form an independent team consisting of other independent organisations to investigate the shooting incident.
6. We urge President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to stop sending troops to Timika West Papua and to promote a respectful and peaceful approach in handling the issue.
7. In order to maintain West Papua as a land of peace, we ask that the Amungsa-Timika people and all the Papuans in West Papua to keep calm and not be easily provoked.
End of the chr
onology of the arrest and some proposed solutions. Thank you for your attention and good cooperation.
Jayapura, 21 July 2009
A recent shooting incident; Drew Nicholas Grant, an Australian national who worked for PT Freeport, was shot dead by unknown people at Mile-52 on Saturday (July 11 at 5.00am). Drew was with Mr Lucan Jhon Biggs (driver) and Maju Pandjaitan in a Toyota land Cruiser (reg.no: 01-2578). They were on their way from Tembagapura to Timika.
Following the incident, several personnel of mobile brigade from Amole 2 were shot on the 12 to 13 July 2009. These incidents attracted lots of attention from various leaders of Indonesian state institutions, NGOs, Churches within the country and overseas. Secretary of the ministry for security and political affairs, high ranking officials from Indonesian military and state police headquarters, for instance, have visited (Timika) West Papua. After the visit, 700 organic and non-organic personnel from Indonesian military and state police were sent to the area to begin the joint military and police sweeping operations at the PT Freeport Indonesia area.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation, however, did not take place at the PT Freeport Indonesia area but at Timika town and the target of the operation was the ordinary civilians. In a brutal sweeping operation , the Indonesian military and police arrested 7 civilians in the middle of Timika town.
The arrest took place at 15:00 on July 20, 2009. These civilians were just ordinary people who were doing their daily activities in Timika town. Their names are as follows:
No. Name Age Tribe of origin
01. Piter Beanal 70 years Amungme Head of tribe
02. Janes Uanman 68 years Amungme Community leader
03. Tomi Beanal 20 years Amunme Youth
04. Eltinus Beanal 19 years Amungme Youth
05. Simon Jawame 38 years Amungme Father of a family
06. Domininggus Beanal 25 years Amungme Youth
07. Jaring beanal 16 years Amungme Child
08. Samuel Toffly 29 years Key Youth
09. Petrus Kanisius Luther 40 years Tanimbar Father of a family
Eyewitness informed us that the military sweeping operations were conducted on the streets, public places and inside family homes.
Besides, the Indonesian security brutally destroyed Demianus Beanal’s house. Demianus who worked for PT Freeport Indonesia lived at Jln Paulus Magal, RT. 04 Kwamki Baru. Many other civilians were beaten, kicked and tortured by the Indonesian military. They used the weapon handles to beat the civilians.
The brutal sweeping operation and arrests of the civilians caused fear and traumatic experience. Many people who had experienced similar brutality in the past now have fled and escaped to the jungles.
The Indonesian military and police sweeping operation did not respect the Amungsa people’s human dignity and it was conducted unlawfully (not according to the Indonesian law). We regret that the operation was not conducted professionally. We believe that by using the violent approach, the Indonesian security forces will not be able to reveal the actor behind the shooting of the Australian worker. In addition, the security forces have made a propaganda to change the public opinions of the conflict by arresting, terrorising, and intimidating innocent civilians. This repeats the same shooting incident at Mile 62-63 Tembagapura Timika in 2002 that caused the arrest of ordinary civilians such as Revd. Isak Ondowame and others.
In order to avoid the propaganda and to reveal the actor who shot Mr Drew Grant (38) and others, and to avoid the arrest of civilians in Timika West Papua, we propose the following recommendations:
1. We urge the Australian government to immediately send Australian Federal Police to do a depth investigation of the shooting of Mr Drew grant. This investigation is conducted independently from the Indonesian state police investigation.
2. We urge the Indonesian state police especially the regional police in Papua to conduct the investigation professionally and avoid destroying people’s houses and arresting the civilians.
3. We urge the regional police of Papua to immediately release 9 civilians who are in Timika Police custody. Their arrests can worsen the security situation in Timika.
4. We urge the security forces to stop terrorising and arresting civilians in Timika West Papua.
5. We urge the National Commission on human rights to form an independent team consisting of other independent organisations to investigate the shooting incident.
6. We urge President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to stop sending troops to Timika West Papua and to promote a respectful and peaceful approach in handling the issue.
7. In order to maintain West Papua as a land of peace, we ask that the Amungsa-Timika people and all the Papuans in West Papua to keep calm and not be easily provoked.
End of the chr
onology of the arrest and some proposed solutions. Thank you for your attention and good cooperation.
Jayapura, 21 July 2009
Friday 24 July 2009
Papuans act to protect forests and fight climate change
Saturday, July 25, 2009 3:33 Adianto P. Simamora ,
The Jakarta Post , Jakarta
A coalition of green activists launched an action plan Thursday to tackle the severe threat of rampant deforestation in Papua.
The coalition, which includes Greenpeace, Papua NGO Network (Foker), Papua People's Assembly (MRP) and the Samdhana Institute, announced the establishment of working groups to formulate forest management policy and the financing steps needed to protect Papua's forests, indigenous forest-dependant peoples and biodiversity, as well as to fight climate change.
"The only way to save Papua's forests, people and biodiversity and to fight global climate change is to take global action immediately. This means industrialized nations must find at least US$40 billion per year to protect the world's rapidly diminishing forests and make deep emissions cuts at home," Yuyun Indradi, a Greenpeace Southeast Asia forest campaigner, said in a statement.
Head of the Papua forestry agency, Marthen Kayoi, said Papua's forests, home to the world’s richest biodiversity, sustained 70 percent of the population, but they still lived below the poverty line.
"At least 20 percent of Papua's 40 million hectares of forest have already gone. Urgent action needs to be taken to protect the remaining forest and to safeguard the rights of the indigenous peoples who depend on them.
"Forest solutions in Papua New Guinea can also be used in Papua so we are very keen to work and scale up the eco-forestry activity here as well. This could be considered as an early-action effort to protect Papua's forest,” PNG eco-forestry activist and Greenpeace's forest campaigner, Sam Moko, said.
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/07/23/papuans-act-protect-forests-and-fight-climate-change.html
The Jakarta Post , Jakarta
A coalition of green activists launched an action plan Thursday to tackle the severe threat of rampant deforestation in Papua.
The coalition, which includes Greenpeace, Papua NGO Network (Foker), Papua People's Assembly (MRP) and the Samdhana Institute, announced the establishment of working groups to formulate forest management policy and the financing steps needed to protect Papua's forests, indigenous forest-dependant peoples and biodiversity, as well as to fight climate change.
"The only way to save Papua's forests, people and biodiversity and to fight global climate change is to take global action immediately. This means industrialized nations must find at least US$40 billion per year to protect the world's rapidly diminishing forests and make deep emissions cuts at home," Yuyun Indradi, a Greenpeace Southeast Asia forest campaigner, said in a statement.
Head of the Papua forestry agency, Marthen Kayoi, said Papua's forests, home to the world’s richest biodiversity, sustained 70 percent of the population, but they still lived below the poverty line.
"At least 20 percent of Papua's 40 million hectares of forest have already gone. Urgent action needs to be taken to protect the remaining forest and to safeguard the rights of the indigenous peoples who depend on them.
"Forest solutions in Papua New Guinea can also be used in Papua so we are very keen to work and scale up the eco-forestry activity here as well. This could be considered as an early-action effort to protect Papua's forest,” PNG eco-forestry activist and Greenpeace's forest campaigner, Sam Moko, said.
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/07/23/papuans-act-protect-forests-and-fight-climate-change.html
Q+A-Attacks at Papua mine: what is the impact on Freeport?
JAKARTA, July 24 (Reuters) - A series of shootings this month near Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc's (FCX.N) massive Grasberg mine in Indonesia has raised concerns over the possible impact on the mine's operations.
Grasberg has the world's largest recoverable reserves of copper, accounting for nearly 40 percent of Freeport's total copper reserves of 93 billion pounds, and the largest gold reserves.
Freeport said the shootings have not affected production.
Papuan police said on Friday that two people had been killed in shooting-related incidents this month: Australian technical expert Drew Grant and an unnamed security guard. At least 10 people were wounded, including seven police.
Here are some questions and answers about the situation:
WHAT'S BEHIND THESE ATTACKS?
Probably money.
With its vast natural resources -- copper, gold, timber -- Papua has long been regarded as a honeypot, and Freeport is Indonesia's top tax contributor, paying $1.2 billion in royalties and other taxes in 2008.
For years, Indonesia's military ran various business interests on the side to supplement their low pay, and were particularly active in resource-rich Papua and Aceh.
The Indonesian government is responsible for providing security arrangements for the Grasberg mine, deploying about 1,850 government security personnel. Freeport Indonesia, the local unit, contributed $8 million last year in support costs, covering food, housing, fuel, and other allowances.
Analysts say the recent outbreaks of violence are most likely due to conflicts between the police and the military over these security arrangements and related business ventures.
The attacks may be intended to force the government or Freeport to increase security, or to pay more to those providing it, or increase the presence of one faction over another.
They could also be related to who has access to tailings from the mine or illegal mining in the area, as these may provide an additional source of income.
Defence Minister Juwono Sudarsono told reporters that "criminal groups" could be responsible because they want to carry out gold panning in the area, earning as much as $3,500 a month from such activities, a very high sum by Indonesian standards.
The West Papua Advocacy Team, a rights group, said a fight between the military and the mobile police brigade, Brimob, could be the reason for the attacks.
"Brimob is pretty much running the illegal gold mining, access to the tailings. That has been a constant source of irritation because Freeport is trying to get the military to shut down the tailings. So perhaps Brimob is concerned about that," said spokesman Edmund McWilliams.
IS THERE ANY RELATION TO THE FREE PAPUA MOVEMENT (OPM)
Few analysts believe these attacks have anything to do with the OPM, which has waged a low-level insurgency for decades and which is generally thought to be poorly armed.
The attackers in the recent shootings appeared to use weapons similar to those used by the military, although they could have been stolen from the military.
"Typically, if they are going to stage attacks, OPM don't stick around to attack again and again. And some of the people who have been detained are not Papuans; the notion that you have non-Papuans in the OPM doesn't make sense," McWilliams said.
In 2002, two American teachers and their Indonesian companion were killed in an ambush outside the Freeport installation. A Papuan separatist received a life sentence and six others were handed shorter jail terms, but the incident also sparked suspicions the Indonesian military were involved.
WHAT IMPACT HAS THIS HAD ON FREEPORT'S MINE?
So far, Freeport says it has not affected production.
Freeport said on its website it expects its Indonesian unit to sell 1.3 billion pounds of copper and 2.2 million ounces of gold this year, up from 1.1 billion pounds of copper and 1.2 million ounces of gold in 2008.
In the first six months of 2009, Freeport Indonesia produced 807 million recoverable pounds of copper, surging from 422 million pounds in the same period last year.
Foreign reporters require special permission to visit Papua and it is difficult to obtain accurate information about what is happening on the ground.
However, so far, all the attacks have taken place on a winding stretch of road between the area where some of the mine workers live and the mine itself.
Vehicles travelling along this route are exposed: they have to drive slowly, which means they are vulnerable to snipers in the surrounding countryside.
Freeport has been taking its workers up in convoys, protected by guards, but on one occasion when the convoy came under fire, they had to turn back. If the attacks remain low-level, it is unlikely this would have much impact on the mine's operations.
Most of the mine workers and key staff live on-site up at the mine.
COULD IT GET WORSE AND HIT OPERATIONS AT THE MINE?
If many more people are killed, Freeport may have to stop transporting workers along this route, in which case it could potentially affect staffing at the mine and impact production
Alternatively, mine-workers may become so concerned about their safety that they refuse to travel this route.
Freeport employs about 21,053 workers and contractors in Papua, one of the poorest parts of the Indonesian archipelago, so there are strong economic reasons why workers may be prepared to take the risk.
CAN THE SECURITY THREAT BE CONTAINED?
On a conference call with Wall Street analysts this week, Freeport's chief executive officer, Richard Adkerson, said six people had been charged with murder in the killing of the Australian worker. [ID:nN21367229]
Human rights organisations have raised concerns that those detained may not be the real perpetrators but could be convenient scapegoats as the authorities rush to solve the problem.
"A race to find scapegoats appears under way," the U.S-based West Papua Advocacy Team said in a statement. (Reporting by Sunanda Creagh and Fitri Wulandari; Writing by Sara Webb and Ed Davies; Editing by Michael Urquhart
http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSJAK20475620090724
Grasberg has the world's largest recoverable reserves of copper, accounting for nearly 40 percent of Freeport's total copper reserves of 93 billion pounds, and the largest gold reserves.
Freeport said the shootings have not affected production.
Papuan police said on Friday that two people had been killed in shooting-related incidents this month: Australian technical expert Drew Grant and an unnamed security guard. At least 10 people were wounded, including seven police.
Here are some questions and answers about the situation:
WHAT'S BEHIND THESE ATTACKS?
Probably money.
With its vast natural resources -- copper, gold, timber -- Papua has long been regarded as a honeypot, and Freeport is Indonesia's top tax contributor, paying $1.2 billion in royalties and other taxes in 2008.
For years, Indonesia's military ran various business interests on the side to supplement their low pay, and were particularly active in resource-rich Papua and Aceh.
The Indonesian government is responsible for providing security arrangements for the Grasberg mine, deploying about 1,850 government security personnel. Freeport Indonesia, the local unit, contributed $8 million last year in support costs, covering food, housing, fuel, and other allowances.
Analysts say the recent outbreaks of violence are most likely due to conflicts between the police and the military over these security arrangements and related business ventures.
The attacks may be intended to force the government or Freeport to increase security, or to pay more to those providing it, or increase the presence of one faction over another.
They could also be related to who has access to tailings from the mine or illegal mining in the area, as these may provide an additional source of income.
Defence Minister Juwono Sudarsono told reporters that "criminal groups" could be responsible because they want to carry out gold panning in the area, earning as much as $3,500 a month from such activities, a very high sum by Indonesian standards.
The West Papua Advocacy Team, a rights group, said a fight between the military and the mobile police brigade, Brimob, could be the reason for the attacks.
"Brimob is pretty much running the illegal gold mining, access to the tailings. That has been a constant source of irritation because Freeport is trying to get the military to shut down the tailings. So perhaps Brimob is concerned about that," said spokesman Edmund McWilliams.
IS THERE ANY RELATION TO THE FREE PAPUA MOVEMENT (OPM)
Few analysts believe these attacks have anything to do with the OPM, which has waged a low-level insurgency for decades and which is generally thought to be poorly armed.
The attackers in the recent shootings appeared to use weapons similar to those used by the military, although they could have been stolen from the military.
"Typically, if they are going to stage attacks, OPM don't stick around to attack again and again. And some of the people who have been detained are not Papuans; the notion that you have non-Papuans in the OPM doesn't make sense," McWilliams said.
In 2002, two American teachers and their Indonesian companion were killed in an ambush outside the Freeport installation. A Papuan separatist received a life sentence and six others were handed shorter jail terms, but the incident also sparked suspicions the Indonesian military were involved.
WHAT IMPACT HAS THIS HAD ON FREEPORT'S MINE?
So far, Freeport says it has not affected production.
Freeport said on its website it expects its Indonesian unit to sell 1.3 billion pounds of copper and 2.2 million ounces of gold this year, up from 1.1 billion pounds of copper and 1.2 million ounces of gold in 2008.
In the first six months of 2009, Freeport Indonesia produced 807 million recoverable pounds of copper, surging from 422 million pounds in the same period last year.
Foreign reporters require special permission to visit Papua and it is difficult to obtain accurate information about what is happening on the ground.
However, so far, all the attacks have taken place on a winding stretch of road between the area where some of the mine workers live and the mine itself.
Vehicles travelling along this route are exposed: they have to drive slowly, which means they are vulnerable to snipers in the surrounding countryside.
Freeport has been taking its workers up in convoys, protected by guards, but on one occasion when the convoy came under fire, they had to turn back. If the attacks remain low-level, it is unlikely this would have much impact on the mine's operations.
Most of the mine workers and key staff live on-site up at the mine.
COULD IT GET WORSE AND HIT OPERATIONS AT THE MINE?
If many more people are killed, Freeport may have to stop transporting workers along this route, in which case it could potentially affect staffing at the mine and impact production
Alternatively, mine-workers may become so concerned about their safety that they refuse to travel this route.
Freeport employs about 21,053 workers and contractors in Papua, one of the poorest parts of the Indonesian archipelago, so there are strong economic reasons why workers may be prepared to take the risk.
CAN THE SECURITY THREAT BE CONTAINED?
On a conference call with Wall Street analysts this week, Freeport's chief executive officer, Richard Adkerson, said six people had been charged with murder in the killing of the Australian worker. [ID:nN21367229]
Human rights organisations have raised concerns that those detained may not be the real perpetrators but could be convenient scapegoats as the authorities rush to solve the problem.
"A race to find scapegoats appears under way," the U.S-based West Papua Advocacy Team said in a statement. (Reporting by Sunanda Creagh and Fitri Wulandari; Writing by Sara Webb and Ed Davies; Editing by Michael Urquhart
http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSJAK20475620090724
More shootings reported at Papua mine
Updated at 4:09pm on 24 July 2009
Confusion remains over how many people have been killed and wounded near the Grasberg mine in the Timika area in Papua.
There are reports that more shootings have taken place targetting employees of a US mining company, Freeport.
Gunmen ambushed a convoy of Freeport vehicles on the sole road from the coast to the mine, killing at least two people.
A series of ambushes killed three people on the same road earlier this month.
Radio New Zealand International reports there is widespread concern over the police investigation, which now also involves the Indonesian military who are considered by some as suspects in the attacks.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/stories/2009/07/24/1245bc798b77
Copyright © 2009 Radio New Zealand
Confusion remains over how many people have been killed and wounded near the Grasberg mine in the Timika area in Papua.
There are reports that more shootings have taken place targetting employees of a US mining company, Freeport.
Gunmen ambushed a convoy of Freeport vehicles on the sole road from the coast to the mine, killing at least two people.
A series of ambushes killed three people on the same road earlier this month.
Radio New Zealand International reports there is widespread concern over the police investigation, which now also involves the Indonesian military who are considered by some as suspects in the attacks.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/stories/2009/07/24/1245bc798b77
Copyright © 2009 Radio New Zealand
Papua Assembly Urges Open Probe of Freeport Mine Shootings
July 24, 2009
Christian Motte
The Papuan People’s Assembly, a body representing the cultural and social rights of Papuans, on Friday urged the police to find those responsible for a recent series of armed attacks at the massive Freeport gold and copper mine in Timika.
Frans Wosprakrik, the deputy chief of the assembly, also known as the MRP, asked that the culprits be found quickly, and pledged that the assembly would support the investigation as long as it was open and fair. He also said that calls demanding the closure of PT Freeport Indonesia’s mining operations there by some communities and nongovernmental organizations were unwarranted.
“We can look at the problem and find the solutions to it,” Wosprakrik said. “It might be that people’s rights were neglected, which needs to be addressed.”
He said those behind the Timika shootings likely had grievances against the mining company’s operations in the area, speculating that the attacks were carried out by people who felt personally disgruntled by Freeport.
“If there is dissatisfaction, it must be revealed, solved and ended,” he said.
Bery Nahdian Forqan, the executive director of leading environmental watchdog Walhi, is among those calling on Freeport to end its activities in Papua. He has argued that unless this was done, the level of violence would continue to increase.
“The best way to solve the problem is to stop the source of the problem, which is Freeport,” he said.
Rights group Imparsial said in a press release that the attacks in Timika had to have been planned and conducted by trained assailants, with experience in handling weapons and the expertise to evade tight security.
Arkilaus Arnesius Baho, the chairman of the National League for the Struggle of the People of West Papua, said that the primary motivation behind the violence in Timika was likely the perceived injustice among ethnic Papuans surrounding the exploitation of the province’s natural resources.
http://thejakartaglobe.com/news/papua-assembly-urges-open-probe-of-freeport-mine-shootings/320131
Christian Motte
The Papuan People’s Assembly, a body representing the cultural and social rights of Papuans, on Friday urged the police to find those responsible for a recent series of armed attacks at the massive Freeport gold and copper mine in Timika.
Frans Wosprakrik, the deputy chief of the assembly, also known as the MRP, asked that the culprits be found quickly, and pledged that the assembly would support the investigation as long as it was open and fair. He also said that calls demanding the closure of PT Freeport Indonesia’s mining operations there by some communities and nongovernmental organizations were unwarranted.
“We can look at the problem and find the solutions to it,” Wosprakrik said. “It might be that people’s rights were neglected, which needs to be addressed.”
He said those behind the Timika shootings likely had grievances against the mining company’s operations in the area, speculating that the attacks were carried out by people who felt personally disgruntled by Freeport.
“If there is dissatisfaction, it must be revealed, solved and ended,” he said.
Bery Nahdian Forqan, the executive director of leading environmental watchdog Walhi, is among those calling on Freeport to end its activities in Papua. He has argued that unless this was done, the level of violence would continue to increase.
“The best way to solve the problem is to stop the source of the problem, which is Freeport,” he said.
Rights group Imparsial said in a press release that the attacks in Timika had to have been planned and conducted by trained assailants, with experience in handling weapons and the expertise to evade tight security.
Arkilaus Arnesius Baho, the chairman of the National League for the Struggle of the People of West Papua, said that the primary motivation behind the violence in Timika was likely the perceived injustice among ethnic Papuans surrounding the exploitation of the province’s natural resources.
http://thejakartaglobe.com/news/papua-assembly-urges-open-probe-of-freeport-mine-shootings/320131
Concern over violence following Timika attacks
Posted at 23:06 on 23 July, 2009 UTC
The West Papua Advocacy Team has voiced concern over the impact of police sweep operations in Timika following the attacks.
The Team’s Ed McWilliams says according to their sources on the ground, at least twenty local Papuans have been detained and interrogated by police without access to lawyers, with reports that an elderly detainee has been badly beaten.
Mr McWilliams says they’re troubled that the investigation process may deny justice both for the victims of the shootings and the local Papuans.
“One of the other concerns is that we’re concerned that, as in the past, a consequence of all this violence will be even greater violence metted out against the Papuan civillians in the vicinity with sweep operations taking place nominally against the OPM (separatist movement) but in effect dealing with civillians in the villages and so on.”
News Content © Radio New Zealand International
PO Box 123, Wellington, New Zealand
The West Papua Advocacy Team has voiced concern over the impact of police sweep operations in Timika following the attacks.
The Team’s Ed McWilliams says according to their sources on the ground, at least twenty local Papuans have been detained and interrogated by police without access to lawyers, with reports that an elderly detainee has been badly beaten.
Mr McWilliams says they’re troubled that the investigation process may deny justice both for the victims of the shootings and the local Papuans.
“One of the other concerns is that we’re concerned that, as in the past, a consequence of all this violence will be even greater violence metted out against the Papuan civillians in the vicinity with sweep operations taking place nominally against the OPM (separatist movement) but in effect dealing with civillians in the villages and so on.”
News Content © Radio New Zealand International
PO Box 123, Wellington, New Zealand
Thursday 23 July 2009
Treason Trial for 15 Suspects Begins in Papua’s Nabire
July 23, 2009
Christian Motte
Jayapura. The trial of 15 people accused of treason just days before April’s legislative elections began on Thursday in Papua’s Nabire District Court.
The group was arrested on April 6 during preparations for a rally in support of an organization called the International Lawyers for West Papua in the United States. Four of the five witnesses presented on Thursday were Nabire Police officers.
The defendants’ lawyers, Gustaf Kawer and Ari Maturbongs, said after Thursday’s hearing that the prosecutor’s office would need to present better evidence in order to make a case that treason had been committed.
Kawer said Thursday’s testimony from the witnesses had painted a picture of actions “far from treason or rebellion.”
On April 3, a peaceful rally was held by the West Papua National Committee. Five of the 15 on trial attended. On April 5, the 15 men now on trial allegedly met with others at a cabin in Nabire to plan another peaceful rally, which was to be held the next day. Participants at the gathering reportedly prepared banners for the demonstration.
The rally was aimed at voicing opposition to Papua’s status as a special autonomous region, and also at denouncing the legislative elections to be held on April 9.
The rally was also meant to mark the launch of the so-called International Parliament for West Papua (IPWP).
On the day of the planned rally, Nabire Police raided the cabin, firing their guns and arresting suspects as the group prepared for the demonstration.
New York-based Human Rights Watch has since renewed its call for the Indonesian government to revoke laws that criminalize free expression.
“Papua officials should stop using the criminal law for political purposes,” said Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.
“Now is the time for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to live up to his words and show Papuans he is serious about promoting tolerance of different political views.”
http://thejakartaglobe.com/news/treason-trial-for-15-suspects-begins-in-papuas-nabire/319906
Christian Motte
Jayapura. The trial of 15 people accused of treason just days before April’s legislative elections began on Thursday in Papua’s Nabire District Court.
The group was arrested on April 6 during preparations for a rally in support of an organization called the International Lawyers for West Papua in the United States. Four of the five witnesses presented on Thursday were Nabire Police officers.
The defendants’ lawyers, Gustaf Kawer and Ari Maturbongs, said after Thursday’s hearing that the prosecutor’s office would need to present better evidence in order to make a case that treason had been committed.
Kawer said Thursday’s testimony from the witnesses had painted a picture of actions “far from treason or rebellion.”
On April 3, a peaceful rally was held by the West Papua National Committee. Five of the 15 on trial attended. On April 5, the 15 men now on trial allegedly met with others at a cabin in Nabire to plan another peaceful rally, which was to be held the next day. Participants at the gathering reportedly prepared banners for the demonstration.
The rally was aimed at voicing opposition to Papua’s status as a special autonomous region, and also at denouncing the legislative elections to be held on April 9.
The rally was also meant to mark the launch of the so-called International Parliament for West Papua (IPWP).
On the day of the planned rally, Nabire Police raided the cabin, firing their guns and arresting suspects as the group prepared for the demonstration.
New York-based Human Rights Watch has since renewed its call for the Indonesian government to revoke laws that criminalize free expression.
“Papua officials should stop using the criminal law for political purposes,” said Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.
“Now is the time for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to live up to his words and show Papuans he is serious about promoting tolerance of different political views.”
http://thejakartaglobe.com/news/treason-trial-for-15-suspects-begins-in-papuas-nabire/319906
Inside The Papuan Resistance
(From THE FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW)
By Bertil Lintner The Indonesian presidential election on July 8 seems likely to give Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono another five years in office. He is ahead of other candidates in opinion polls, and his Democratic Party emerged as the country's largest in the parliamentary elections in April. A high degree of normality and stability has returned to Indonesia after years of political and social turmoil. Only a decade ago, many feared that Indonesia would break up along ethnic lines and become a "Southeast Asian Yugoslavia."
In the end, only East Timor went its own way. But that was a special case, according to the official line from Jakarta and also foreign governments. When Indonesia was proclaimed an independent state in 1945, it laid claims to all the territories of the former Dutch East Indies, which did not include the then-Portuguese colony on the eastern half of Timor island. It was invaded in 1975 and formally annexed by Indonesia the following year -- a move that was not recognized by the international community. East Timor remained on the United Nations' international list of territories that still had to be decolonized, which made it possible for the world body to intervene in 1998 and supervise a referendum on independence in 1999. East Timor became a fully independent republic in 2002.
Aceh on the northern tip of Sumatra had a far more complicated, internal insurgency. But, in August 2005, an accord was reached between the Indonesian government and the previously separatist Free Aceh Movement, or Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, ending decades of strife in that troubled territory by granting it autonomy. Less powerful centrifugal forces as well as sectarian violence in other parts of Sumatra, in the South Moluccas, or Maluku, Borneo and elsewhere, appear to have faded away.
Only one major separatist issue remains a thorn in President Yudhoyono's side: the long-simmering conflict in the western Indonesian part of the island of New Guinea. Since 2003, the area has been divided into two provinces -- Papua and West Papua, but referred to by the resistance only as "West Papua" -- and is almost constantly rocked by antigovernment protests, and the hoisting of the "Morning Star" independence flag, which is a crime in Indonesia.
In the most recent incident, demonstrators and security forces clashed in Nabire on April 6, just a few days before Indonesia's parliamentary election. According to the Australia-based NGO Institute for Papuan Advocacy and Human Rights, nine people were shot by security forces and at least one policeman was injured by traditional arrows fired by the protesters. In April 2008, several hundred demonstrators took to the streets of Jayapura, the capital of the province of Papua and previously of the entire Indonesian-held New Guinea. And in January this year, hundreds of protesters, some armed with machetes and other crude weapons, besieged a police station in the coastal Papuan town of Timika after hearing that a man had been shot during a fight between off-duty officers and local tribesmen. The police opened fire wounding at least four people.
The Indonesian English-language daily Jakarta Globe reported in its January 28 issue: "The [Indonesian] National Human Rights Commission has been monitoring the Timika police because of numerous cases of officers as well as military personnel allegedly shooting civilians, many of which remain unresolved. Last year, a 40-year-old man was shot and killed while attending a festival said to have been linked to the outlawed Free Papua Movement." The report continued: "Pro-independence sentiment in Papua has increased in recent years, fueled in part by discontent that profits from its natural resources are being siphoned out of the province with the assistance of the central government. U.S.-based Freeport McMoran Copper and Gold Co. operates mines in Papua."
Also in January this year, 11 West Papuans were found guilty of subversion and sentenced to three and three-and-a-half year prison sentences. In March last year, they had taken part in a demonstration in the town of Manokwari, where the Morning Star flag had been displayed. According to a report from the Institute for Papuan Advocacy and Human Rights: "The panel of judges led by Elsa Mutiara Napitupulu said that the men had posed a threat to the integrity of the Indonesian state in seeking the separation of West Papua. The judgment said that there had been an increase in separatist activities in the recent past throughout the whole of West Papua which were being organized from abroad."
In today's world, that is not far-fetched. The Free Papua Movement, Organisasi Papua Merdeka, maintains an office in Stockholm, Sweden, from where they are in regular e-mail contact with activists in the territory, halfway around the globe. And for the exiled leaders of the anti-Indonesian movement in West Papua, there is only one way forward for their struggle: total independence. They reject a negotiated autonomy deal, similar to what GAM has achieved for Aceh. "Autonomy is not a lasting solution," Ruben Maury from the OPM office in Sweden said. "The people want independence, not autonomy. We've already made up our minds."
What the people of Indonesian New Guinea actually want is impossible to ascertain -- but the OPM did indeed unilaterally declare independence on July 1, 1971. Yet while international rights groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have expressed concern over human-rights abuses in the area, the OPM's plea for independence has found few sympathizers among foreign governments. The only exceptions are small Pacific island states such as Vanuatu -- where the OPM maintains another liaison office -- and Nauru. No major powers, it seems, wants to see the dismemberment of Indonesia's sprawling archipelago, which many thought possible after former strongman Suharto fell in 1998 and liberal decentralization measures were passed. The buck stopped at East Timor.
But West Papua is still a borderline case. When the Dutch finally left Indonesia in 1949 -- four years after the declaration of independence -- they held on to their western half of New Guinea. They argued that the territory was culturally different from the rest of the old colony and, if ceded to Indonesia, the Papuans would be exploited by the more politically and economically sophisticated Javanese. The new Indonesian nation, however, saw it differently. One of the catch phrases of independence leader Sukarno was of Indonesian sovereignty "from Sabang to Merauke," from Sabang on a small island off the northwestern tip of Sumatra to the town on Merauke in southeastern Papua, i.e., the entire length and breadth of the former Dutch East Indies.
The Dutch initially ignored such sovereignty slogans and throughout the 1950s initiated several moves to make their part of New Guinea an independent state. Basic education was improved, a naval academy was opened, Papuans began to serve in the military as well as civil services and local elections were held in December 1961. The territory even adopted its own national anthem and flag with the white Morning Star, symbolizing the hope for a new day era.
All this happened at a time when Southeast Asia was in deep turmoil. Communist movements were strong throughout the region and especially in Indonesia, where it was a powerful and legal political party. The United States warned the Netherlands against trying to defend its New Guinean possession if Jakarta attempted to use force to extend its writ to Merauke. "We're victims of Cold War politics," says Daniel Kafiar, who, together with Mr. Maury, heads the OPM's Stockholm office. "No one ever asked us what we wanted. It all happened above our heads."
Among the many documents Mr. Kafiar carries in his briefcase is a copy of a secret letter from former U.S. President John F. Kennedy to then Dutch Prime Minister J E de Quay dated April 2, 1962. In that document, Kennedy warned that "this could be a war in which neither the Netherlands nor the West could win in any real sense. Whatever the outcome of particular military encounters, the entire free world position in Asia would be seriously damaged. Only the communists would benefit from such a conflict." The document continues: "If the Indonesian Army were committed to all-out war against the Netherlands, the moderate elements within the Army and the country would be quickly eliminated, leaving a clear field for communist intervention. If Indonesia were to succumb to communism in these circumstances, the whole non-communist position in Vietnam, Thailand and Malaya would be in grave peril, and as you know these are areas in which we in the United States have heavy commitments and burdens."
The Netherlands gave in and, on Aug. 15, 1962, signed an agreement in New York with Indonesia according to which the United Nations would assume temporary control over the territory. It would then be transferred to Indonesia -- but on the condition that the Papuans would have the right to decide their own future. On May 1, 1963, Indonesia took full charge of the territory and first renamed it West Irian and later Irian Jaya. In mid-1969, the promised "referendum" was eventually held, but The Act of Free Choice, as it was called, was open only to 1,025 handpicked delegates, which predictably all voted in favor of integration with Indonesia. On Nov. 19, 1969, the U.N. General Assembly accepted the results and Western countries turned a deaf ear to local protests over the dubious circumstances of the vote.
By 1965, the OPM had already been established along with an armed wing, the National Liberation Army, or OPM-TPN, and hit-and-run attacks were launched in the highlands. Mr. Maury joined the OPM in 1970, abandoning his family and a job as a pharmacist in Jayapura. He had been sent to study in the Netherlands in the 1950s as part of preparations for independence from the then Dutch colony. A better-educated middle class, it was thought, was needed to run an independent state and Mr. Maury was one of the well-schooled candidates.
In 1962, he and five other Papuans were invited to visit Indonesia, where they met President Sukarno and other state leaders. But the Papuans made no promises to Jakarta: "We told them we were on a study tour," Mr. Maury says. "They sent beautiful girls to our hotel rooms, but I didn't give in to the temptation, or to their suggestion that we should join Indonesia."
Mr. Maury spent eight years in the jungles and highlands of West Papua before he and some of his ill-equipped followers crossed into independent Papua New Guinea in 1978. But the newly independent state did not want to antagonize its powerful Indonesian neighbor, and promptly arrested the OPM fighters. In 1979, they were all released and four of them were accepted as political refugees in Sweden. Among them was Jacob Prai, one of the founders of the OPM, and John Otto Ondawame, who now represents the movement in Port Vila, Vanuatu. Mr. Kafiar arrived in Sweden a year later and the OPM established an information office in Stockholm.
They are not the only Third World revolutionary movement to have sought sanctuary in Sweden. Hasan di Tiro, the leader of the Acehnese independence movement who was able to return to Indonesia following the 2005 accords, also arrived there in the 1970s, as did representatives of the Muslim separatists in Southern Thailand and cadre from the insurgent Communist New People's Army in the Philippines. Later, even members of Peru's radical Maoist Shining Path movement took refuge in Sweden. They were all drawn by Sweden's then liberal refugee policy and it was difficult for Swedish authorities to check the background of some of the less attractive armed groups' members. That has helped fuel a popular backlash against political-asylum seekers there, which, in recent years, has led to electoral gains by anti-immigrant groups.
But as Sweden's welcome cools, the Papuans may fare better than others. Although they look as foreign as other refugees, there is plenty of interest in New Guinea in Sweden. This is largely thanks to a Swedish aristocrat and explorer, Sten Bergman, who in the 1950s spent several years in western New Guinea. His best-selling book, "My Father is a Cannibal," has been translated into several languages, and helped preserve a somewhat romantic image of life in territory's remote villages. Bergman was indeed "adopted" by a village chief who once had eaten human flesh and was dressed in little more than a penis-sheath.
For their part, the OPM delegates do not wish to capitalize on this romanticized past, but rather are trying to reach out to governments all over the world to promote their cause. In 1987, Mr. Kafiar went to Vanuatu where he met Walter Lini, the country's first prime minister. At the time, Lini and Vanuatu provided some support for the Kanak indigenous independent movement in French-held New Caledonia and was then the only country in the region to support East Timor's quest for independence.
Mr. Kafiar remained in Vanuatu for two years before returning to Sweden, and the Vanuatu office has been taken over by Mr. Ondawame and Andy Ayamiseba, who the Stockholm-based representatives see as closet moles for Indonesia. That's in part a reflection of the deep-seated factionalism within the OPM, which is bidding to forge a unified state from an area with hundreds of different languages and clans, many of which have historically been at war with each other.
In comparison, the Aceh movement was fairly unified and many feel the OPM would find it difficult to establish a coherent sense of nationhood among the Papuans. They just need look across the border into Papua New Guinea, which many observers consider a nearly failed state with rampant crime, murder rates among the world's highest, and severe environmental degradation driven by an economy almost entirely dependent on the export of raw natural resources. Still, the OPM's Stockholm representatives see separation from Indonesia as just the first step; the next would be a union with Papua New Guinea. "Historically, our ties have been with Oceania. Our connections have always been eastwards, not westwards," Mr. Kafiar says. "The border between western and eastern New Guinea was drawn up in Europe in the late 19th century, with a pen and a ruler," he asserts. "It's a straight line. People have relatives on both side of the frontier."
But before independence or unification with New Guinea could happen -- if that ever materialized -- the western half would have to deal with fundamental demographic changes that have taken place over the past few decades. Between 1975 and 1995, a government-sponsored migration program resettled tens of thousands of people, mainly from Java, in Irian Jaya. In addition, many people from other, more densely populated parts of Indonesia moved to the territory, attracted by business opportunities and the search for new lands to cultivate. In a July 2007 document titled "West Papuan Churches' Deepest Concern and Appeal to the International Community," local church leaders stated: "The current composition of the West Papuan population is 30% native and 70% migrants. The native West Papuans have been marginalized in all aspects of life."
Even if exaggerated, the statement reflects the new demographic composition and cause for potential conflicts in Papuan society. The native Papuans are mostly Animist or Christian, while the new migrants are predominantly Muslim. Groups of Islamic extremists are also known to have visited the territory, leading to fears that the kind of sectarian fighting that tore apart the Maluku islands from 2000 to 2002 could one day erupt in Papua and West Papua. The delicate demographic and religious balance in Indonesia's two easternmost provinces is perhaps the reason why outside powers seem to prefer a continuation of the status quo rather than advocate the OPM's separation from Indonesia. The Papuans may be victims of Cold War politics, as Mr. Maury and Mr. Kafiar argue, but two generations later the situation has become more ethnically complicated.
As such, unrest in the area is likely to continue, even if the OPM these days lacks the forces to resist Indonesia's mighty military. However, recent demonstrations in Manokwari, Jayapura and elsewhere could serve as warnings for more conflict and resistance to come in one of Indonesia's most remote and strife-torn provinces. The OPM's armed struggle in the highlands has been succeeded by a civil movement in urban areas, and that could be even more difficult for the central authorities to contain than jungle guerrilla warfare. After decades of mismanagement and dubious policies, President Yudhoyono, if re-elected, may be forced to take a fresh look at the Papuan issue -- because it is not likely to go away like other, more easily solvable ethnic conflicts in the Indonesian archipelago.
---
Mr. Lintner is a journalist based in Thailand.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20090717-713841.html
By Bertil Lintner The Indonesian presidential election on July 8 seems likely to give Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono another five years in office. He is ahead of other candidates in opinion polls, and his Democratic Party emerged as the country's largest in the parliamentary elections in April. A high degree of normality and stability has returned to Indonesia after years of political and social turmoil. Only a decade ago, many feared that Indonesia would break up along ethnic lines and become a "Southeast Asian Yugoslavia."
In the end, only East Timor went its own way. But that was a special case, according to the official line from Jakarta and also foreign governments. When Indonesia was proclaimed an independent state in 1945, it laid claims to all the territories of the former Dutch East Indies, which did not include the then-Portuguese colony on the eastern half of Timor island. It was invaded in 1975 and formally annexed by Indonesia the following year -- a move that was not recognized by the international community. East Timor remained on the United Nations' international list of territories that still had to be decolonized, which made it possible for the world body to intervene in 1998 and supervise a referendum on independence in 1999. East Timor became a fully independent republic in 2002.
Aceh on the northern tip of Sumatra had a far more complicated, internal insurgency. But, in August 2005, an accord was reached between the Indonesian government and the previously separatist Free Aceh Movement, or Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, ending decades of strife in that troubled territory by granting it autonomy. Less powerful centrifugal forces as well as sectarian violence in other parts of Sumatra, in the South Moluccas, or Maluku, Borneo and elsewhere, appear to have faded away.
Only one major separatist issue remains a thorn in President Yudhoyono's side: the long-simmering conflict in the western Indonesian part of the island of New Guinea. Since 2003, the area has been divided into two provinces -- Papua and West Papua, but referred to by the resistance only as "West Papua" -- and is almost constantly rocked by antigovernment protests, and the hoisting of the "Morning Star" independence flag, which is a crime in Indonesia.
In the most recent incident, demonstrators and security forces clashed in Nabire on April 6, just a few days before Indonesia's parliamentary election. According to the Australia-based NGO Institute for Papuan Advocacy and Human Rights, nine people were shot by security forces and at least one policeman was injured by traditional arrows fired by the protesters. In April 2008, several hundred demonstrators took to the streets of Jayapura, the capital of the province of Papua and previously of the entire Indonesian-held New Guinea. And in January this year, hundreds of protesters, some armed with machetes and other crude weapons, besieged a police station in the coastal Papuan town of Timika after hearing that a man had been shot during a fight between off-duty officers and local tribesmen. The police opened fire wounding at least four people.
The Indonesian English-language daily Jakarta Globe reported in its January 28 issue: "The [Indonesian] National Human Rights Commission has been monitoring the Timika police because of numerous cases of officers as well as military personnel allegedly shooting civilians, many of which remain unresolved. Last year, a 40-year-old man was shot and killed while attending a festival said to have been linked to the outlawed Free Papua Movement." The report continued: "Pro-independence sentiment in Papua has increased in recent years, fueled in part by discontent that profits from its natural resources are being siphoned out of the province with the assistance of the central government. U.S.-based Freeport McMoran Copper and Gold Co. operates mines in Papua."
Also in January this year, 11 West Papuans were found guilty of subversion and sentenced to three and three-and-a-half year prison sentences. In March last year, they had taken part in a demonstration in the town of Manokwari, where the Morning Star flag had been displayed. According to a report from the Institute for Papuan Advocacy and Human Rights: "The panel of judges led by Elsa Mutiara Napitupulu said that the men had posed a threat to the integrity of the Indonesian state in seeking the separation of West Papua. The judgment said that there had been an increase in separatist activities in the recent past throughout the whole of West Papua which were being organized from abroad."
In today's world, that is not far-fetched. The Free Papua Movement, Organisasi Papua Merdeka, maintains an office in Stockholm, Sweden, from where they are in regular e-mail contact with activists in the territory, halfway around the globe. And for the exiled leaders of the anti-Indonesian movement in West Papua, there is only one way forward for their struggle: total independence. They reject a negotiated autonomy deal, similar to what GAM has achieved for Aceh. "Autonomy is not a lasting solution," Ruben Maury from the OPM office in Sweden said. "The people want independence, not autonomy. We've already made up our minds."
What the people of Indonesian New Guinea actually want is impossible to ascertain -- but the OPM did indeed unilaterally declare independence on July 1, 1971. Yet while international rights groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have expressed concern over human-rights abuses in the area, the OPM's plea for independence has found few sympathizers among foreign governments. The only exceptions are small Pacific island states such as Vanuatu -- where the OPM maintains another liaison office -- and Nauru. No major powers, it seems, wants to see the dismemberment of Indonesia's sprawling archipelago, which many thought possible after former strongman Suharto fell in 1998 and liberal decentralization measures were passed. The buck stopped at East Timor.
But West Papua is still a borderline case. When the Dutch finally left Indonesia in 1949 -- four years after the declaration of independence -- they held on to their western half of New Guinea. They argued that the territory was culturally different from the rest of the old colony and, if ceded to Indonesia, the Papuans would be exploited by the more politically and economically sophisticated Javanese. The new Indonesian nation, however, saw it differently. One of the catch phrases of independence leader Sukarno was of Indonesian sovereignty "from Sabang to Merauke," from Sabang on a small island off the northwestern tip of Sumatra to the town on Merauke in southeastern Papua, i.e., the entire length and breadth of the former Dutch East Indies.
The Dutch initially ignored such sovereignty slogans and throughout the 1950s initiated several moves to make their part of New Guinea an independent state. Basic education was improved, a naval academy was opened, Papuans began to serve in the military as well as civil services and local elections were held in December 1961. The territory even adopted its own national anthem and flag with the white Morning Star, symbolizing the hope for a new day era.
All this happened at a time when Southeast Asia was in deep turmoil. Communist movements were strong throughout the region and especially in Indonesia, where it was a powerful and legal political party. The United States warned the Netherlands against trying to defend its New Guinean possession if Jakarta attempted to use force to extend its writ to Merauke. "We're victims of Cold War politics," says Daniel Kafiar, who, together with Mr. Maury, heads the OPM's Stockholm office. "No one ever asked us what we wanted. It all happened above our heads."
Among the many documents Mr. Kafiar carries in his briefcase is a copy of a secret letter from former U.S. President John F. Kennedy to then Dutch Prime Minister J E de Quay dated April 2, 1962. In that document, Kennedy warned that "this could be a war in which neither the Netherlands nor the West could win in any real sense. Whatever the outcome of particular military encounters, the entire free world position in Asia would be seriously damaged. Only the communists would benefit from such a conflict." The document continues: "If the Indonesian Army were committed to all-out war against the Netherlands, the moderate elements within the Army and the country would be quickly eliminated, leaving a clear field for communist intervention. If Indonesia were to succumb to communism in these circumstances, the whole non-communist position in Vietnam, Thailand and Malaya would be in grave peril, and as you know these are areas in which we in the United States have heavy commitments and burdens."
The Netherlands gave in and, on Aug. 15, 1962, signed an agreement in New York with Indonesia according to which the United Nations would assume temporary control over the territory. It would then be transferred to Indonesia -- but on the condition that the Papuans would have the right to decide their own future. On May 1, 1963, Indonesia took full charge of the territory and first renamed it West Irian and later Irian Jaya. In mid-1969, the promised "referendum" was eventually held, but The Act of Free Choice, as it was called, was open only to 1,025 handpicked delegates, which predictably all voted in favor of integration with Indonesia. On Nov. 19, 1969, the U.N. General Assembly accepted the results and Western countries turned a deaf ear to local protests over the dubious circumstances of the vote.
By 1965, the OPM had already been established along with an armed wing, the National Liberation Army, or OPM-TPN, and hit-and-run attacks were launched in the highlands. Mr. Maury joined the OPM in 1970, abandoning his family and a job as a pharmacist in Jayapura. He had been sent to study in the Netherlands in the 1950s as part of preparations for independence from the then Dutch colony. A better-educated middle class, it was thought, was needed to run an independent state and Mr. Maury was one of the well-schooled candidates.
In 1962, he and five other Papuans were invited to visit Indonesia, where they met President Sukarno and other state leaders. But the Papuans made no promises to Jakarta: "We told them we were on a study tour," Mr. Maury says. "They sent beautiful girls to our hotel rooms, but I didn't give in to the temptation, or to their suggestion that we should join Indonesia."
Mr. Maury spent eight years in the jungles and highlands of West Papua before he and some of his ill-equipped followers crossed into independent Papua New Guinea in 1978. But the newly independent state did not want to antagonize its powerful Indonesian neighbor, and promptly arrested the OPM fighters. In 1979, they were all released and four of them were accepted as political refugees in Sweden. Among them was Jacob Prai, one of the founders of the OPM, and John Otto Ondawame, who now represents the movement in Port Vila, Vanuatu. Mr. Kafiar arrived in Sweden a year later and the OPM established an information office in Stockholm.
They are not the only Third World revolutionary movement to have sought sanctuary in Sweden. Hasan di Tiro, the leader of the Acehnese independence movement who was able to return to Indonesia following the 2005 accords, also arrived there in the 1970s, as did representatives of the Muslim separatists in Southern Thailand and cadre from the insurgent Communist New People's Army in the Philippines. Later, even members of Peru's radical Maoist Shining Path movement took refuge in Sweden. They were all drawn by Sweden's then liberal refugee policy and it was difficult for Swedish authorities to check the background of some of the less attractive armed groups' members. That has helped fuel a popular backlash against political-asylum seekers there, which, in recent years, has led to electoral gains by anti-immigrant groups.
But as Sweden's welcome cools, the Papuans may fare better than others. Although they look as foreign as other refugees, there is plenty of interest in New Guinea in Sweden. This is largely thanks to a Swedish aristocrat and explorer, Sten Bergman, who in the 1950s spent several years in western New Guinea. His best-selling book, "My Father is a Cannibal," has been translated into several languages, and helped preserve a somewhat romantic image of life in territory's remote villages. Bergman was indeed "adopted" by a village chief who once had eaten human flesh and was dressed in little more than a penis-sheath.
For their part, the OPM delegates do not wish to capitalize on this romanticized past, but rather are trying to reach out to governments all over the world to promote their cause. In 1987, Mr. Kafiar went to Vanuatu where he met Walter Lini, the country's first prime minister. At the time, Lini and Vanuatu provided some support for the Kanak indigenous independent movement in French-held New Caledonia and was then the only country in the region to support East Timor's quest for independence.
Mr. Kafiar remained in Vanuatu for two years before returning to Sweden, and the Vanuatu office has been taken over by Mr. Ondawame and Andy Ayamiseba, who the Stockholm-based representatives see as closet moles for Indonesia. That's in part a reflection of the deep-seated factionalism within the OPM, which is bidding to forge a unified state from an area with hundreds of different languages and clans, many of which have historically been at war with each other.
In comparison, the Aceh movement was fairly unified and many feel the OPM would find it difficult to establish a coherent sense of nationhood among the Papuans. They just need look across the border into Papua New Guinea, which many observers consider a nearly failed state with rampant crime, murder rates among the world's highest, and severe environmental degradation driven by an economy almost entirely dependent on the export of raw natural resources. Still, the OPM's Stockholm representatives see separation from Indonesia as just the first step; the next would be a union with Papua New Guinea. "Historically, our ties have been with Oceania. Our connections have always been eastwards, not westwards," Mr. Kafiar says. "The border between western and eastern New Guinea was drawn up in Europe in the late 19th century, with a pen and a ruler," he asserts. "It's a straight line. People have relatives on both side of the frontier."
But before independence or unification with New Guinea could happen -- if that ever materialized -- the western half would have to deal with fundamental demographic changes that have taken place over the past few decades. Between 1975 and 1995, a government-sponsored migration program resettled tens of thousands of people, mainly from Java, in Irian Jaya. In addition, many people from other, more densely populated parts of Indonesia moved to the territory, attracted by business opportunities and the search for new lands to cultivate. In a July 2007 document titled "West Papuan Churches' Deepest Concern and Appeal to the International Community," local church leaders stated: "The current composition of the West Papuan population is 30% native and 70% migrants. The native West Papuans have been marginalized in all aspects of life."
Even if exaggerated, the statement reflects the new demographic composition and cause for potential conflicts in Papuan society. The native Papuans are mostly Animist or Christian, while the new migrants are predominantly Muslim. Groups of Islamic extremists are also known to have visited the territory, leading to fears that the kind of sectarian fighting that tore apart the Maluku islands from 2000 to 2002 could one day erupt in Papua and West Papua. The delicate demographic and religious balance in Indonesia's two easternmost provinces is perhaps the reason why outside powers seem to prefer a continuation of the status quo rather than advocate the OPM's separation from Indonesia. The Papuans may be victims of Cold War politics, as Mr. Maury and Mr. Kafiar argue, but two generations later the situation has become more ethnically complicated.
As such, unrest in the area is likely to continue, even if the OPM these days lacks the forces to resist Indonesia's mighty military. However, recent demonstrations in Manokwari, Jayapura and elsewhere could serve as warnings for more conflict and resistance to come in one of Indonesia's most remote and strife-torn provinces. The OPM's armed struggle in the highlands has been succeeded by a civil movement in urban areas, and that could be even more difficult for the central authorities to contain than jungle guerrilla warfare. After decades of mismanagement and dubious policies, President Yudhoyono, if re-elected, may be forced to take a fresh look at the Papuan issue -- because it is not likely to go away like other, more easily solvable ethnic conflicts in the Indonesian archipelago.
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Mr. Lintner is a journalist based in Thailand.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20090717-713841.html
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