Allegations that Australia is funding death squads in West Papua have brought the troubled province back to Australian attention.
Blanket denials by both Indonesian and Australian governments – standard policy for such reports in the past, no longer cut the mustard.
The players respond
The killing of Papuan activist Mako Tabuni by Indonesian police was for Jakarta a legitimate operation against a violent criminal shot while evading arrest. That Tabuni bled to death from his untreated wounds while in police custody did not rate a mention.
The Australian response was more measured. Foreign Minister Bob Carr took the allegation that Tabuni had been assassinated seriously because the partially Australian funded and trained elite anti-terrorist organisation, Densus 88, was accused of playing a role in the killing.
Bob Carr raised the issue of human rights with foreign minister Marty Natalegawa in June this year in his first official visit to Indonesia EPA/Adi Weda
For once there was a direct Australian connection to the human rights abuses that have been happening in West Papua for decades. Australian taxpayers may indeed be helping to fund Indonesian death squads. Carr called on the Indonesians to make a full enquiry into the affair.
The Indonesian response was to appoint Brigadier General Tito Karnavian as Papua’s new Police Chief. This sends the clearest possible message that Jakarta intends to deal with the Papuan separatists’ insurgency with lethal force, rather than diplomacy and negotiation.
Many activists have been arrested and a concerted effort is underway to break the back of the urban based, non-violent Papuan rights organisations, such as Tabuni’s KNPB (Komite Nasional Papua Barat).
Independence
Most Papuans would favour independence over Indonesian occupation. This is a recipe for ongoing military operations, repression and human rights abuse as the Indonesian military and police hunt down “separatists”.
This seems to suit most players. West Papua is the Indonesian military’s last zone of exclusive control after the loss of Aceh and East Timor. It’s a fabulous prize to control as extensive (legal and illegal) logging, huge mining projects and massive development funds provide rich pickings for those in control, while incoming migrants are drawn in by economic opportunities unavailable elsewhere. It is really only the Papuans who are suffering in this massive free-for-all.
The plight of the Papuans is slowly but surely seeping into the global consciousness. While modern technology allows West Papua’s riches to now be exploited, it also allows the stories and images of Papuan suffering to emerge. Increased Indonesian militarisation and repression only exacerbate this trend.
A new East Timor?
This is the same trajectory that East Timor’s long struggle for freedom followed: an overwhelmingly dominant military on the ground but a growing sense of outrage within the international community, especially in the Western nations. This led Indonesia to be treated almost as a pariah nation and underpinned East Timor’s rapid shift to independence in the wake of Suharto’s fall.
While no other nation supports West Papuan independence, except Vanuatu sporadically, and the rule of the Indonesian state appears unassailable, a dangerous dynamic is developing.
As the situation in West Papua deteriorates, human rights abuses will continue, with the very real prospect of a dramatic increase in violence to genocidal levels.
The ingredients are there: stark racial, religious and ideological differences coalescing around a desire for Papuan resources and Papuans’ land, on one hand, and independence on the other. Indeed many Indonesians, as well as the Indonesian state, already view Papuan separatists as traitors.
This should rightly concern Australians: we are in a quasi-military alliance with Indonesia through the 2006 Lombok Treaty. We are a player, albeit minor, in these events. When there is a divide in the opinion of the political, military and bureaucratic elite, and that of the wider population, as occurred in Australia over Indonesia’s occupation of East Timor, the majority view tends to eventually prevail. And the majority view, formed by such programmes as the ABC 7.30 report, is moving to one of sympathy for the Papuans and antipathy towards Indonesia for what many see as a re-run of East Timor’s disastrous occupation. This does not bode well for relations between the two countries.
Words or bullets?
Indonesia runs the risk of having its widely heralded democratisation process stained by the Papuan conflict. There is also the fact that while West Papua remains a military zone the Indonesian army will continue to be unaccountable and largely outside of civilian control, stymieing anti-corruption efforts not just in Papua but through out the country. The consequences for the Papuans are abundantly clear: no basic rights and a life lived in fear.
While there are no quick or easy solutions to this conundrum, one choice is manifestly clear: does the answer lie in more words or more bullets?
Jakarta has so far rejected meaningful dialogue in favour of a beefed up security approach. Australia, and Australians, should forcefully criticise this as being against our own, and Indonesia’s (let alone the Papuans’) long-term interests.
If the West Papuan conflict continues to follow the East Timor trajectory this problem will continue to grow, relations will become strained and tensions rise. It’s worth remembering that Australia and Indonesia very nearly came to blows over East Timor. Let’s learn from the past and encourage, and promote, meaningful dialogue between all parties.
Jim Elmslie does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.
Pulling together: Solidarity Work and western aid to the Indonesian police and military.
Not long ago video of a talk given by American investigative journalist, Alan Nairn had me transfixed in front of my computer screen. Alan was one of the journalists who was present at the time of the Santa Cruz massacre in Dili, East Timor in 1991. The Indonesian military beat Alan severely on that day, which seems to have left him with an undying commitment to expose the crimes of the Indonesian Special Services (Kopassus) and to ferret out crucial information about American support for the Indonesian military.
I think it is worthwhile to summarise some of Alan’s analysis about East Timor’s liberation, the fall of Suharto and the power of the United States in world affairs. He sees the Santa Cruz events as pivotal. First to remind you of what was happening in East Timor just over 20 years ago: the Timorese resistance was trying to come to terms with a bitter let-down –they had been anticipating a parliamentary delegation from Portugal, and were gearing up to use this chance to tell their story and ask for international support. But the delegation was cancelled. Then on 28 October a young student Sebastiao Gomes was killed by armed militia after he sought shelter in the Motael Church.
Two weeks later on 12 November 1991 following Sebastiao’s memorial mass, a funeral procession proceeded to the cemetery. As their numbers swelled, the emboldened participants began to unfurl pro-independence banners, and to shout ‘Viva Timor-Leste’. They knew that what they were doing was incredibly dangerous but they proceeded anyway under the eyes of the military, and because they chose to keep going, Nairn says, history was changed.
When they reached the cemetery the military simply blocked their escape route, raised their rifles and opened live fire on the demonstrators. Soldiers chased down those who tried to escape and shot them in the back. A list of 271 victims was compiled but the full number of the dead is almost certainly higher as many ‘disappeared’.
What made this event different to all the other massacres that took place was that on this occasion the word got out and the world did take notice. New Zealand lost one of its own – a wonderful young man called Kamal Bamadhaj, an Indonesian speaker who was there to help his fellow activists as they met with members of the clandestine resistance.
The Santa Cruz massacre and the death of Kamal jolted the New Zealand solidarity movement and it exposed the moral bankruptcy of the New Zealand Government’s East Timor policy – in a nutshell Government sought to appear outraged at the loss of its citizen while at the same time pursuing careful diplomacy aimed at preserving good relations with Indonesia.
In the United States, as Alan Nairn related , the massacre was the catalyst for the formation of the highly effective US East Timor Action Network (ETAN) which is still going like a ball of fire today alongside the more recent West Papua Advocacy Team (WPAT).
ETAN set about lobbying the US Congress about US military funding and within a year they had succeeded in bringing to an end the military aid under the International Military Education and Training programme (IMET). It took a few years longer before the solidarity network was able to expose other defence funding under JCET Joint Combined Exchange and Training, but this training was also suspended in 1998, not long before Suharto’s fall from power.
In 1998 the students led mass demonstrations calling on Suharto to step down. The military did not gun them down. Why was this? Nairn is convinced based on his interviews with such figures as Admiral Sudono, Suharto’s Security Minister, that the Indonesian soldiers did not open fire on the students on the streets of Jakarta because they feared ‘another Dili’ . Jakarta had established that the US had a limit on its tolerance for violence. Of course it was forced to learn the lesson again a year later when its military laid siege to East Timor after it had voted for independence.
Obviously the solidarity movement can only claim a small part of the credit for East Timor’s liberation. The political and economic upheaval in Indonesia, the growing sympathy of democratic-minded Indonesians and of course the steadfastness of the Timorese resistance must all be factored in. But if solidarity activists had not exposed western hypocrisy in training and supplying the Indonesian military with weapons, there might have been a different outcome.
Interviewed in September 1999 at the height of the crisis in East Timor, Noam Chomsky said: ‘The US government will do something positive- more accurately it will stop doing something horribly negative – with regard to East Timor only if public pressure makes it essential to do so by raising the social costs of continuing to abet the massacre.”
Globally there were massive demonstrations, tens of thousands demonstrated across Australia, human chains encircled the embassies of the UN Security Council members. In Portugal people wore mourning white, and hundreds of Timorese and Portuguese traveled to Spain to demonstrate at the nearest Indonesian Embassy. On 9 September traffic stopped in Lisbon, as thousands got out of their cars to stand in the road to observe a nationwide 3 minute silence.
Then President Clinton delivered his eleventh hour ultimatum to Indonesia: end the violence or invite the international community ‘to help’.
Nairn also pointed out for an American audience, that in the United States in the twenty-first century demonstrators do not get shot. The United States uses its guns, drones and troops against other countries to preserve its interests but at home a civil liberties framework usually prevails. Demonstrators may face tear gas or even arrest but they won’t be killed. The deaths happen elsewhere at the business end of the guns supplied by the United States.
In this part of the world I believe we also have power. If we want to understand how important our region and our governments are to the United States, the official cables released by Wikileaks are very helpful. We know that the ANZUS Treaty is defunct, and New Zealand will not be reversing its no nuclear warships ban, but that hasn’t really stopped ongoing defence and military cooperation between our three nations.
Instead of ANZUS meetings Australia and the US now hold AUSMIN meetings. When Kevin Rudd hosted that meeting last year he said it marked the 60th anniversary of the ANZUS Treaty and described the meeting as ‘the premier forum for advancing Australia-US cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region and globally.’.
From the Wikileaks cables you can trace New Zealand’s secretive restoration of defence and intelligence ties over 2008 and 2009 and also how US officials upped the pressure as they prepared for an AUSMIN meeting.
So we are definitely part of the same club, even if New Zealand’s actual military and intelligence contribution to the US led may seem small in comparison with Australia. We are part of the Five Eyes or UKUSA intelligence community and we have our own satellite spy base at Waihopai, an integral part of the global intelligence network feeding intelligence to the US National Security Agency (NSA).
Indonesia has had an important place in US strategic plans since Suharto took power in 1965. From that time Indonesia opened up its economy to western investment. US spokespeople talk about the importance of the constructive partnership with the country which has the world’s largest Muslim population, holding it up as an example of moderate Islam and a supporter in combating terrorism and extremism. Indonesia a leading member of the ASEAN group of pro-western nations, and key to US plans to extend its presence in the Asia-Pacific. Now that the cold war is over ASEAN is no longer a bulwark against communist expansion, but it is still held up a political, economic and security counterbalance to the influence of China
It is of course also true that Indonesia offers New Zealand and Australia important trade and investment opportunities. Indonesia ranks as New Zealand’s eighth largest export market, mainly for our meat and dairy products. We have signed an agreement with Indonesia called a Trade and Investment Framework and we import products such as crude oil and timber from Indonesia The balance of trade is in our favour. New Zealand’s Super Fund and some other Crown Financial Institutes invest in Freeport McMoran and in Rio Tinto, Freeport’s joint venture partner.
It isn’t easy to persuade our Governments to put at risk these kinds of perceived or real advantages, but as Alan Nairn pointed out it can be done. The fact that we are closely allied with the United States imposes constraints on our Governments, but they don’t always dance to America’s tune. The most obvious and important New Zealand example being our 1985 refusal to accept port visits from nuclear capable warships.
If Australia or New Zealand did take a stand – whether supporting a referendum, a mediated dialogue process or suspending their defence ties, it would have a significant impact.
When I read letters from the New Zealand or Australian Foreign Minister it is clear that they are following a similar script. These are the phrases that appear in the letters received by our respective solidarity groups:
‘The Australian Government has long supported Indonesia’s territorial integrity, including its sovereignty over the Papua provinces.’ ‘The New Zealand Government is committed to the peaceful development of Papua as part of Indonesia, where the human rights of all citizens are respected and upheld.’ And there is usually a reference to support for ‘the full implementation of the 2001 Special Autonomy Law’.
New Zealand ‘upholds human rights’ by ‘quiet diplomacy’ and ‘constructive engagement’ through aid. In bilateral meetings behind closed doors New Zealand Ministers raise human rights concerns with their Indonesian counterparts. These exchanges can be pointed, but frequently they are amount to little more than ritual expressions that require minimal response from the Indonesian side. At its worst this ‘quiet diplomacy’ is a blatant exercise in collusion
This hasn’t gone unnoticed in West Papua.
Forkorus Yaboisembut, was appointed President of the ‘Republic of West Papua’ at the October 19 Congress and now he and four colleagues are on trial for makar or treason. He is scathing of this refusal of the countries like Australia and New Zealand to confront the issue of self-determination, suggesting that a focus on human rights alone is to define the Papuan people as ‘merely the colonial possession of a foreign power’.
The Indonesian authorities impose tight restrictions on media visits to West Papua, but a new kind of citizen journalism is now asserting itself.and the real state of affairs is becoming better known. ‘You tube’ videos circulate after atrocities to tell the story as no words can. Shocking videos circulated after the events on October 19 when the Jayapura Congress was forcibly dispersed by the security forces. A visiting West Papuan leader showed footage to some of our parliamentarians recently – I thought they would be appalled by the sight of heavily armed police opening fire from aloft their armoured vehicles, but they were also shaken at the sight of civilians being rounded up and forced into crouching postures as they were herded into the middle of the soccer field.
Those events were closely followed by an 8000 strong strike at the Freeport McMoran mine, during which two of the striking workers were killed by the security forces. The news of the strike spread round the world through union and occupy movement circles. In New Zealand a popular glossy magazine, Metro, devoted a long features article to the story of the mine, the strike and New Zealand’s investment in it. In August last year Australian academics and media exposed leaked Kopassus documents detailing the network of spies and informers that support Indonesia’s iron control.
Gradually Indonesia’s giant agribusiness proposal for the Merauke district is also becoming known. The Indonesian President has grand ambitions for the up to 1.6 million hectares project which he hopes will feed Indonesia, and then feed the world. The proposed crops such as corn sugar, rice and palm oil will destroy the fragile ecology, displace the local people and bring vast numbers of new migrant. Indigenous West Papuans are already believed to be a minority in their own land, so it is hardly surprising if a sense of now or never desperation is driving this latest wave of activism.
Are we managing to lever any change?
It is hard to believe that the officials in the Foreign Affairs and Defence Ministries of Australia and New Zealand have not given some thought to the possibility that a West Papua is at boiling point and that their uncritical support for Indonesia may blow up in their faces. After all they were caught wrong-footed by the firestorm in East Timor in 1999.
I have witnessed a few tiny cracks in the last year:
When the Pacific Island Forum met in Auckland New Zealand activists were joined by West Papuan leaders and supportive MPs from the Mana and Green Parties. We ensured that the West Papua issue was under the noses of the Forum Heads of Government. The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon was a guest at the Forum and addressed a public meeting during his time in Auckland. Subsequently a journalist questioned him about our very visible West Papua lobby. He came dangerously close to talking about self-determination: ‘whether you are an independent state or a non-self-governing territory or whatever, the human rights is inalienable and a fundamental principle of the United Nations’. He subsequently clarified that he did not state that West Papua should be placed on the agenda of the Decolonisation Committee, any such call would not be his to make as that was a matter for Member States.
The New Zealand Foreign Minister, Murray McCully is being forced to confront the West Papua issue more often. In August 2010 a very graphic video depiction of the torture of two Papuan farmers was circulating just as Mr McCully was scheduled to meet in Jakarta with his counterpart Marty Natalegawa, so questions were asked. At the time of the Forum, Mr McCully did not make time to meet West Papuan representatives personally but he did instruct his officials to meet with John Ondawame and Rex Rumakiek, and I understand a similar meeting with West Papuan representatives also took place in New York.
I am hoping that this might be an echo of the small shift to acceptance of dialogue or constructive communication on the part of the Indonesian President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. The President’s meetings with outspoken Church leaders in recent months seems a potentially hopeful sign, and will have been noted by western governments.
Over the past twelve years that IHRC has been working on West Papua we have tried hard to find the points of leverage that might prompt our Government take effective West Papua action. Obviously we have not made any amazing breakthroughs, and disappointingly there have steps backward such as the Government’s restoration of military training ties in early 2007. But I think there is some evidence at the very least that officials and politicians are worried., and perhaps we can again draw some lessons from our history of activism on East Timor.
When I probed back through declassified government documents relating to East Timor I found that the officials had been weighing up what we activists were doing and saying. I was surprised to find that we had had more influence than we knew at the time.
To give one example, in March 1995 a military training visit of five Indonesian officers was postponed as the NZ Defence Attache explained:
‘The reason for the postponement is due to increasing interest among the New Zealand public over recent matters in East Timor. In addition to general public interest in all regional and international affairs there is in New Zealand a small but sophisticated and well co-ordinated lobby, sympathetic to the claims of East Timorese exiles, who seek any opportunity to generate anti-Indonesian feeling. It was therefore thought unwise to risk exposing the visitors to the possibility of becoming the focus of media campaigns, demonstrations, petitions etc. at this time.’
Deputy Secretary of Foreign Affairs Neil Walter held a damage control meeting with the Indonesian Ambassador and wrote:
On military contacts/exchanges/exercises, I said this was a matter on which both sides needed to work closely together…It wouldn’t do the relationship any good to present the anti-Indonesian school of thought with large tailor-made pegs on which to hang further protests. Careful management was needed.
So I want to focus finally on New Zealand’s direct relationship with the Indonesian security forces.: the training support we offer to the Indonesian military and a Pilot training programme to the police in West Papua.
New Zealand’s military training for Indonesia largely consists of bilateral officer exchanges: each year an Indonesian officer attends the NZDF Command and Staff College to participate in the Senior Staff Course while New Zealand Defence Force officers attend courses in Indonesia. Recently there has been mention of New Zealand increasing its defence ties with Indonesia by extending the training currently offered to Indonesian officers and hosting higher level visits of Indonesian personnel. Our Government defends this programme on the grounds that engagement with the Indonesian military will promote positive reform, but there is no evidence to support this claim. On the other hand the record shows that New Zealand officials and the New Zealand Minister of Defence at the time (Phil Goff) took the initiative to get the defence relationship resumed, because they considered that this would be in New Zealand’s interests.
A New Zealand Defence Attache commented before defence ties were reestablished: ‘at the moment the New Zealand Indonesia relationship resembled a ‘three-legged stool’ with one leg (ie the defence aspect) missing. In spite of the many reforms that had taken place in recent years, the TNI was still a major force in Indonesian life; without engagement with TNI we could not hope to build a full relationship.’
As far as I know the New Zealand’s police training does not involve improving the lethal or the punitive skills of the officers involved. In fact the community policing model is all about conflict avoidance and working with communities, a positive model of police work. The problem with this training is that we are talking about engaging with the forces of repression. While I believe many of those involved in providing the training sincerely hope their efforts will benefit the West Papuan people and Indonesian civilians, there is limited objective evidence to support this outcome. The risk is always that the New Zealand aid will be co-opted to support Indonesia’s anti-self-determination agenda. After studying the documentation, including reports released under the Official Information Act I believe that this is happening..
The West Papua project: ‘Community Policing: Conflict Resolution in Papua and West Papua provinces’ had ambitious aims: ‘ The project’s purpose was described as enhancing adherence to human rights standards by the INP in the two Papua provinces. ‘ The primary objective of the Project was to contribute to changing the military mind-set of the INP. Anticipated outcomes of the Project were described as ( i) improving human rights (ii) improving security; and (iii) reducing poverty.’
The project began following a request from the Police Area Commander General Tommy Yacobus, in Jayapura in 2006, . Early in 2007 thirty two West Papuan police (only 10 of them indigenous Papuans) attended a workshop in Jayapura at which participants were told how New Zealand police try to build community relations and anticipate and prevent conflict.
The Ministry memos reveal that Jayapura Police Chief had instructions from the National Police Chief to ‘get back the confidence of the community’ following the March 2006 riots. The Police Chief, told the Second Secretary that he wanted to increase the percentage of indigenous Papuans within POLDA Papua which was currently at 4%.,
In late 2010, New Zealand Embassy officials were advised (the name of the Indonesian official they met has been blacked out) that some 1500 Papuan police were recruited in 2009. This would help, the New Zealanders were told, ‘in increasing the effectiveness of policing because of the importance of good information and an understanding of adapt (customary) law and traditions. Police also had a network of informants in every village which allowed for reports of trouble to flow through to Wamena, despite the isolation of many communities, poor roads and absence of communications infrastructure in many areas.’
It is not surprising that West Papuans don’t always welcome the recruitment of indigenous police officers. I am told that the Police have a rigorous interrogation process for potential recruits which ensures that anyone joining up must deny or hide any connection however remote to those who support independence.
The records show, that the Community Policing Initiative had an impact on the Wellington-Jakarta relationship. By September 2008 when New Zealand Embassy representatives visited West Papua they found that Community Policing Initiative had ‘emerged as the centerpiece of New Zealand’s engagement in Papua and West Papua.’
: “In the past Embassy visits to the two provinces have been confined to information gathering. This time it was very different – we had something concrete to offer. That was reflected in the warm reception accorded to us. The NZAID-funded, NZ Police Community Policing (CP) project is now the centerpiece of New Zealand’s constructive engagement approach with Indonesia on the Papua issue. It demonstrates New Zealand is serious in its desire to make a real difference on the ground in the two provinces.”
In fact the Indonesian officials were so pleased with the New Zealanders that an article about the visit appeared in the Papua Pos headed Selandia Baru Menentang OPM or New Zealand opposes OPM. New Zealand officials reassured their hosts that they did not support separatism, but the write up took things a step further. The diplomats wryly recorded later that the article misrepresented the discussions, and their ‘alleged commendation of TNI’.
In 2010 the New Zealand Police commissioned an independent review of its Community Policing programme. When I combed through the lengthy report, I had a growing sense of unease. The first criteria evaluated was ‘strategic relevance’ and the project matched up well, since ‘it is supporting the decentralization efforts of central government through autonomy laws (Otsus).’
‘The Project has strengthened the relationship between the Indonesian and New Zealand police: NZ Police is the only foreign agency that has been permitted to deliver CP training in Papua and West Papua provinces, and NZ Police is the only foreign agency permitted to use serving NZ Police Officers for Project activities in these provinces.’ But who benefits from this close relationship?
The evaluation team struggled with assessing the effectiveness of the project, partly for reasons to do with the lack of before and after data. But they cite a few ‘solid examples’:
“an INP officer said he had employed the skills and approach taught by NZ Police during the training to resolve political unrest in his area, where Papuan nationalists were planning to raise the morning star (the applicable sentence for doing so is 25 years imprisonment). The fact that the training provided a practical tool to assist the INP officer to successfully resolve this issue is a highly effective result for the Project.’
There is nothing to suggest that the NZ Police discussed the right to free expression, let alone any suggestion that they even considered that ‘nationalists’ might have a legitimate claim to genuine self-determination.
The report also looked at risk management and addressed the possibility of personal security risk for the NZ trainers ‘given political stirrings on the ground in Indonesian Papua’ and the ‘risk that NGOs might criticise the Project if training were followed by INP-perpetrated human rights abuses.’ The report says that these risks did not materialise.
This is a bit disappointing since the Indonesia Human Rights Committee has been raising concerns about the police training project since 2008. Our statements have become stronger as we have learnt more about the project. We tie our criticism to human rights reports and other evidence of ongoing police brutality in West Papua, but we concede that we don’t have any evidence that an officer who has participated in New Zealand training has been implicated in a documented instance of abuse.
More recently, Green MP Catherine Delahunty has also voiced her concerns: ‘the road to hell can be paved with good intentions. These policemen appeared to have no context for operating in West Päpua, their focus was on crimes like robbery and alcohol and they made no comment on the lack of democratic freedoms or the need for the West Papuan police to stop colluding with the military in the human rights abuses’
When I visited West Papua in late 2010 I made a point of talking about the police programme, and especially among younger activists, the response to the training was decidedly negative. New Zealand Embassy representatives were in West Papua around the same time, and they also met with civil society representatives, as well as the Governor of Papua, politicians and UN officials. They highlighted the ‘community policing project as a flagship in the province.’ It seems the diplomats did hear some negative feedback about the actions of the police in West Papua and New Zealand engagement, but they rated the overall response to the project as positive.
At the moment, despite the earlier hype, and talk of a second phase, the Community Policing Project has been on pause for two years. From my point of view this is good news. I am just hoping it is because of concerns about violence in West Papua and not because the New Zealand aid budget is being pared down.
I should emphasise that I support New Zealand expenditure on humanitarian aid in West Papua, in fact one of my objections to the military and police training is that it probably edges out constructive programmes. New Zealand offers post-graduate scholarships to up to 50 Indonesian applicants each year. The scheme prioritises students from Eastern Indonesia including West Papua. But a response to a parliamentary question reveals that only two indigenous Papuans were granted post-graduate scholarships in the 2007-2010 period.
I want to emulate Alan Nairn by finishing on a positive note. I believe he is right, solidarity actions can be effective even if we don’t know in advance which actions will be effective. There is a strong case for solidarity work focused on ending military ties and I believe we should widen that to include the police training programmes.
At the elite level Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Britain and Indonesia are tied together in a range of intelligence and defence networks. I believe we could all increase our efficiency and our effectiveness if we did more to work on joint campaigns, and if we shared more research information with each other
Over the years many Papuan leaders have raised the possibility that New Zealand could help to facilitate a peace dialogue for West Papua – drawing on the successful process mediated by New Zealand which helped to resolve the crisis in Bougainville. We weren’t really a neutral party with respect to that conflict either, but we were able to be effective and that also gives me some hope.
Leadbeater, M. (2006). Negligent neighbour : New Zealand’s complicity in the invasion and occupation of Timor-Leste. Nelson, N.Z., Craig Potton Publishing.
Contact: John M. Miller, +1-718-596-7668; mobile: +1-917-690-4391, john@etan.org
Ed McWilliams, +1-575-648-2078, edmcw@msn.com
President Barack Obama
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20500
November 15, 2011
Dear President Obama,
We urge you to seize the opportunity of your imminent return to Indonesia to consider the challenges and opportunities posed by the U.S.-Indonesia relationship more realistically than you have up to now. Your Administration urgently needs a policy that addresses the problems created by the Indonesian security forces’ escalating violations of human rights and criminality and its failure to submit to civilian control. The recent 20th anniversary of the 1991 Santa Cruz massacre in Dili. East Timor (Timor-Leste), when hundreds of peaceful protesters were massacred by Indonesian troops wielding U.S. supplied weapons, reminds us that a lack of accountability for past crimes — in Timor-Leste and throughout the archipelago — keeps those affected from moving on with their lives, while contributing to impunity in the present.
Indonesian military and police forces continue to operate without any accountability before the law. Only in rare instances are individual personnel brought before military tribunals for crimes against civilians, often because of international pressure. Prosecution is woefully inadequate and sentencing, in the rare instance of conviction, is not commensurate with the crime.
Indonesia’s security forces, including the Kopassus special forces and U.S.-funded and -trained Detachment (Densus) 88, continue to employ against civilians weaponry supplied by the U.S. and to use tactics developed as result of U.S. training. In West Papua, these security forces have repeatedly attacked civilians, most recently participants in the October 16-19 Congress and striking workers at theFreeport McMoRan mine. Those assaulted were peacefully asserting their right to assemble and freedom of speech. At the Congress, combined forces, including regular military units, Kopassus, the militarized police (Brimob) and Detachment 88, killed at least five civilians, beat scores more, and were responsible for the disappearance of others.
Moreover, in the central highlands of West Papua, these same forces regularly conduct so called “sweeping operations,” purportedly in search of the very small armed Papuan resistance. These operations have led to the deaths of many innocent civilians and driven thousands from their village into forests where they face life threatening conditions due to inadequate access to shelter, food and medical care.
Indonesian military and police forces continue to operate without any accountability before the law. Only in rare instances are individual personnel brought before military tribunals for crimes against civilians, often because of international pressure. Prosecution is woefully inadequate and sentencing, in the rare instance of conviction, is not commensurate with the crime. Several videoed incidents of military torture of civilians — widely discussed during your November 2010 visit to Indonesia — concluded in just such failures of justice. The concept of command responsibility is rarely considered in the military tribunals.
International monitoring of these developments in West Papua is severely hampered by Indonesian government restrictions on access to and travel within West Papua by foreign journalists, diplomats, researchers, and human rights and humanitarian officials. The International Committee of the Red Cross remains barred from operating an office in West Papua. Indonesian journalists and human rights officials face threats and worse when they try to monitor developments there.
Elsewhere in Indonesia, too many times security forces have stood by or actively assisted in attacks on minority religions, including deadly attacks on Ahmadiyah followers.
The Indonesian security forces — especially the military — are largely unreformed: it has failed to fully divest itself of its business empire, its remains unaccountable before the law, and continues to violate human rights. These forces constitute a grave threat to the continued development of Indonesian democracy. The upcoming national elections in Indonesia present a particularly urgent challenge. The Indonesian military is in position to pervert the democratic process as it has in the past. The military has frequently provoked violence at politically sensitive times, such as in 1998 when it kidnapped tortured and murdered democratic activists. For many years it has relied on its unit commanders, active at the District, sub-District and even village level to influence the selection of party candidates and the elections themselves. The territorial command system is still in place. In the past, U.S. restrictions and conditions on security assistance have resulted in real rights improvements in Indonesia. Your Administration should learn from this history.
Given this threat to democracy and to individuals posed by Indonesian forces, it is essential that the U.S. employ the significant leverage that comes from Indonesia’s desire for U.S. security assistance and training to insist on real reforms of Indonesian security forces. Rhetorical calls for reforms are clearly insufficient. These exhortations have manifestly not worked and readily brushed aside. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s recent expression of “concerns about the violence and the abuse of human rights” in Papua were dismissed by a spokesperson for Indonesia’s President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono , who called the escalating rights violations “only isolated incidents.”
In the past, U.S. restrictions and conditions on security assistance have resulted in real rights improvements in Indonesia. Your Administration should learn from this history and quickly suspend training for those units whose human rights records and impunity are especially egregious, as required by the Leahy law. We specifically urge you to end plans to re-engage with Kopassus and to end assistance to Detachment 88. These actions would demonstrate U.S. Government seriousness in pursuit of real reforms of the security forces in Indonesia.
Jayapura, Papua. Anxiety was apparent among the participants of the Third Papuan People’s Congress on Wednesday as they marched toward the event venue in Abepura, passing by lines of military and police officers in full combat gear and holding assault rifles.
By 8 a.m. that morning, the final day of the three-day congress, security officers were standing at the ready. Five Barracuda armored jeeps were parked not far from the Zakeus oval, the site of the event, as were seven police trucks and three trucks from the region’s Cendrawasih Military Command.
As the congress drew to a close, the 3,100 officers sprang into action, marching toward the venue with their fingers on the triggers of their Pindad SS1 assault rifles. As the prospect of a full-blown attack became evident, fear could be seen in the eyes of many congress-goers.
Minutes later, the situation descended into violence.
Soldiers from the Armed Forces (TNI) and police officers fired bullets into the air and ordered the participants to disband. Some of the officers pointed their weapons directly at the unarmed civilians.
As the crowd dispersed in panic, the troops pressed forward.
A four-by-three-meter gate collapsed, shaken down by TNI officers. It fell onto the some 100 members of the Papuan Caretakers Movement (Petapa) who were guarding the congress.
Those outside the gate did not escape unscathed. Soldiers and police beat them with batons, bamboo poles and the butts of their rifles. Man after man fell to the ground, pleading with the officers to stop the show of force. Their pleas were met with kicking, stomping boots.
“Disband them, disband them immediately,” a high-ranking officer ordered his men. “They have committed acts of treason. Disband them now.”
Several men wearing kotekas, the traditional Papuan penis gourd, tried to push authorities back, but they were greatly outnumbered.
Less than 100 meters from the congress was a monastery and a pastors’ dormitory. Security forces raided it.
“Nobody leave the house. Everyone stay where you are,” several TNI officers shouted, shooting into the air and toward the pastors’ homes.
Later, bullet holes could be seen in some of the walls, and bullet fragments were found in some bedrooms.
“Dozens of officials forced their way into the monastery and walked back and forth for two hours in front of us,” the Rev. Adrianus Tuturu said. “We were so afraid we hid in our rooms.”
More than 300 people were arrested. They included Forkorus Yoboisembut, chairman of the Papuan Customary Council (DAP), and Edison Waromi, president of the West Papua National Authority. The congress had earlier declared the men as president and prime minister of an independent Papua, respectively.
“So you want to be the president of Papua?” an officer told Forkorus, grabbing his shirt. “Try to protect your citizens who we are arresting.”
The arrested were told to squat down with their hands behind their heads for two hours. Some were made to take off their trousers and shirts and lie on the earth. Blood stained many of the Papuans’ cheeks.
“Papua will never be independent. Don’t you dare dream. Forkorus will not set you free,” witness Yustinus Ukago quoted a police officer as saying.
Eventually, security forces told the men to march, still squatting, to the police trucks. As the congress-goers made their way slowly forward, some officers kicked them in the back and side.
Some Papuans managed to escape. They hid in nearby food stalls and pretended to be innocent bystanders or made for bushes or gutters. Others fled into the forest.
Free expression or treason?
Papua has seen a low-level insurgency since Indonesia annexed the resource-rich province in 1969. Following the annexation, exploitation of Papua’s mineral resources, most notably at the hands of American mining company Freeport McMoRan, and a massive security presence fueled resentment toward Jakarta.
In 2000, Indonesia granted the province special autonomous status, giving Papuans greater control over their economy. But the plan opened the floodgates for migrants into the province, further marginalizing the natives.
The recent congress was a continuation of a similar one in 2000, held to unite Papua’s seven tribal areas and discuss the natives’ basic human and political rights.
This year’s congress once again declared independence. “The Papuans’ freedom and independence must be restored in the West Papua country which was stolen by the Indonesian government in 1962,” leaders there proclaimed, announcing the Victoria Crowned Pigeon as a national symbol, the banned Morning Star flag as the national banner and the song “Hai Tanahku Papua” (“Oh My Land Papua”) as the national anthem.
Amnesty International condemned the crackdown, saying it “believes that the right to freedom of expression includes the right to peacefully advocate referendums, independence or any other political solutions that do not involve incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence.”
The heavy-handed repression, the group said, was “a clear violation of the rights to freedom of expression, opinion and peaceful assembly which are guaranteed under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Indonesia is a state party, as well as the Indonesian Constitution.”
But chairman of the House of Representatives commission on defense, Mahfudz Siddiq, said security forces “should have been firmer” and refused to issue a permit for the congress.
The Jayapura Police chief said he would do whatever it took to quash subversion.
“Whoever supports separatism or subversion activity, I will do the same as yesterday [the day of the congress]. I’ll finish them,” Adj. Sr. Comr. Imam Setiawan told state news agency Antara.
Imam said the congress had not been conducted according to the permit it had been issued, so he was forced to take action. He said he was paid to protect civilians and the unity of the nation.
“If there is anyone supporting such movements, I’m ready to die and finish them,” he said. “This is my duty.”
Djoko Suyanto, the coordinating minister for political, legal and security affairs, also defended the government’s tactics, according to Antara.
“The police raided the rally because it was considered as a coup d’etat,” Djoko said. “They declared a state within a state and did not recognize the president of Indonesia.”
The brutality of the crackdown was further revealed the following day, when all but six of the arrested were released. Many of the congress-goers had sustained cuts and bruises, and one man who had been beaten with an automatic rifle had marks all over his body.
Another man had scrape marks on his stomach. He said they came from police dragging him, face down, on the field’s jagged ground.
Of the six who remained in custody, five were charged with treason. The lone exception was Gat Wenda, who was charged under the 1951 Emergency Law for carrying sharp weapons.
The five who face treason charges are Forkorus, Edison and event organizers August Sananay Kraar, Dominikus Sorabut and Selpius Bobii.
Despite military and police claims that security forces only fired warning shots, three dead bodies were found on Thursday morning just behind a military compound some 50 meters away from the congress venue. They were 25-year-old university student Daniel Kadepa and Petapa members Maxsasa Yewi, 35, and Yacob Samonsabra, 53.
That afternoon, three more bodies were uncovered: James Gobay, 25; Yosaphat Yogi, 28; and Pilatus Wetipo, 40.
“The security forces should have used dialogue and persuasion to disperse the crowd,” said Matius Murib, deputy chairman of the Papua branch of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM). “Next week, officials from the central Komnas HAM office will conduct an investigation.”
The Rev. Benny Giay, a respected religious leader and human rights advocate in Papua, said the TNI and police had used disproportionate force by using heavy fire power to quell a meeting of unarmed civilians.
This report is supported by the Pantau Foundation.
This is raw footage of Wednesday’s attack by the Indonesian military and police on the Third Papuan People’s Congress in Jayapura. The footage shows people dancing, soldiers closing in, and gun shots. The video was shot by several observers. The last sequence was shot while the camera person was hiding from gunfire. Police have now confirmed that five people were killed in the attack – human rights groups say it was more.
CURRENT: Arrests
Anywhere between 300 and 800 activists arrested, most released
Core group of 5 in custody at least but could be more, all feared tortured:
- Forkorus Yaboisembut – elected as leader of the broad based movement for peace and justice – possibly paralysed witnessed by another detainee
- Edison Waromi – deputy leader
- Argus Krar
- Selfius Bobii
- Dominikus Sorabut
Released
- Abraham Kareni (who’s son lives in Melbourne) with fractured skull
Charges include treason, rebellion, crimes of hatred against the state. These are colonial laws left over from the Dutch era and they carry long sentences — in some cases up to 20 years.
Police violence, dead and wounded DFAT have confirmed four people are confirmed dead, activists claim six
People identified (all from Petapa or family of:
- Dani Kabepa
- Yakovus Sabonsaba
- Mathias Maidepa
- Martinus Siep
- Tanepi Kobeta
- One additional unidentified member of Petapa, the West Papuan paramilitary guard formed to protect Forkorus Yaboisembut, the man delegates elected as their leader.
Members of the community security force (Petapa) are arrested. Photo: West Papua Media Alerts
-
Claims:
- Numerous people have been savagely beaten, many are in hiding for fear of arrest or worse
- Unverified claims people were shot at point-blank range and bundled into armoured personnel carriers and other vehicles.
- Five people at the Dian Harapan Hospital suffering several wounds: ”One is a woman, Ana Ana Adi, 41. She has got wounds at her right thigh. Pilatus Wetipo, 40, was shot in the right leg. Wiler Hobi (22) has some wounds in his head because of being beaten by the weapon, the other two have blistered wounds
- four people in Sabron Yaru wounded
Members of the community security force (Petapa) are arrested. Photo: West Papua Media Alerts
Reports of violence by Indonesian troops continue to emerge from West Papua. New Matilda is in contact with local sources. We’re publishing regular updates on the situation here. (Warning: graphic content)
On Thursday, New Matilda published a report on the violence at the Third People’s Congress in West Papua. Indonesia military and police opened fire on participants and took activists and leaders into custody. Reports of fatalities and injuries continue to emerge from Jayapura.
New Matilda is in contact with local sources and will continue to update this page as new information emerges.
UPDATE, Friday 21 October, 10am:
This is a phone interview with journalist Alex Rayfield.
“Ferry Marisan, the director of Elsham — a leading human rights organisation based in the capital, Jayapura — has said that six people are confirmed dead.
“We think that a couple of people were shot as the security forces raided the stage, and some later. There are also lots of people with gunshot wounds, some of whom are in hiding and too scared to get medical assistance.
“We’ve had multiple reports that there were 800 people in jail. Many of those have been released, but a core group is still detained, charged with a range of offences including treason, rebellion, crimes of hatred against the state. These are colonial laws left over from the Dutch era and they carry long sentences — in some cases up to 20 years.
“It’s important for people to know that [Congress] is not a radical fringe movement. It’s made up of mainstream Papuan society: academics, church leaders and senior tribal leaders. In fact the radical fringe stayed away from this event because they think it’s not radical enough. So if the Indonesian government thinks this is a minority view, they are sadly mistaken. It is a mainstream view.
“Meanwhile, we should add for Australian audiences, that the strike continues at the Freeport mine [which is part owned by Anglo-Australian company Rio Tinto]. The two events are intimately connected.”
For more information on the Freeport strikes read New Matilda’s coverage here andhere.
UPDATE Friday 21 October, 4.30PM These photos were sent by a credible source to West Papua Media Alerts and allegedly show injuries suffered in police custody. They have not been verified by New Matilda.
[as received in english from Papua National Consensus Team. This was scanned copy. Typos not corrected. - JMM]DECLARATION
FORMING FEDERAL STATE OF WEST PAPUA
On this day Wednesday ,19 October 2011 at the Third National Papua Congress, the people of Papua in Country of West Papua declare:
I.
Proclamation recover and Restore the independence and sovereign of West Papua which was lost to Indonesia annexation on December 1, 1961.
II.
Going into effect Constitution of Federal of West Papua by forming Governance of Federal State of West papua in the form of lifting President and elect Leader of Governance-The Prime Minister.
III.
Government of Federal State of West Papua guarantees the rights of live and rights of endeavor of everyone in the Country of West Papua.
IV.
Indonesia immediately terminates its occupation of West Papua pacifically and prestigious as civilized nation and member of the United Nations.
V.
The Nation Members of the United Nations to confess the Independence of the nation of Papua parallel with the other independences in the globe.
VI.
United Nations Security Council immediately register the Federal State of West Papua becomes the permanent or regular member state of the United Nations
VII.
Authorized the mandate to Papua National Leadership for run of the power of governance, Legislative, Judicative and Commander in Chief of Defense and also as soon as during one year carry out the general Election to chosen the Prime Minister of definitive Governance.
The People of West Papua greatly appreciate on your understanding of the historic injustice that we have suffered and are most grateful for your goverment’s support and recognize for restoration of our sovereign righs.
God Bless us all Sincerely
Forkorus Yaboisembut, SPd.
Head of Papua Customary Law Council Executor of Presidency of West Papua
CC:
1.Secertary General of United Nations
2. The President of United States
3. President of Indonesia
4. Netherland Kingdom
5. Pope in Vatican- Rome
6 .US Members of Congress and Senate
by Victor Yeimo,
International Spokesperson for West Papua National Committee [KNPB]
21st September 2011
[Jayapura]: As the UN General Assembly begins today (21/9) in New York, Indonesia will be in front line of supporting Palestinian efforts to become a member of the United Nations.
Ban Ki-moon waves to protestors for West Papua, PIF NZ Sept 2011 (Photo: Henry Yamo/ PMC)
Indonesia has been supporting the Palestinian case ever since they declared their independence. But what about the fate of West Papua which has been under Indonesian rule for half a century?
This week, from 19 to 28 September 2011, Foreign Affairs Minister, Marty Natalegawa, will be representing Indonesia at the UN General Assembly during its 66th session in New York, United States. He previously recalled, in a press release last Thursday (15/9), that Indonesia had recognized the independence of Palestine just a few hours after it had been declared in 1988.
Mahfudz Siddiq, chairman of House of Representative’s Commission I overseeing foreign affairs, also stated that agreement had been reached by the Indonesian Parliament and Government, for the full support of Palestinian independence and the Palestinian State bid at the UN General Assembly in New York this week.
As a logic consequence of this backing, Indonesia’s foreign policy should also be shown in its commitment to support the right to independence and the recognition of the sovereignty of the people of West Papua. If Indonesia is aware that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories is a state of colonization, then Indonesia has to realize that the occupation of West Papua by Indonesia since 1963 is likewise a state of colonization.
Already too many Palestinians have fallen victims of the Zionist regime of Israel, and already too many West Papuans have fallen victims of the colonialist and militarist regime of Indonesia. It is time for the people of West Papua to set their own destiny, in the same way that the Palestinian people, the people of South Sudan, Kosovo, and others, are deciding their own.
Indonesia as a member of the United Nations should actively participate in promoting and creating world peace. But, what about the fate of the people of West Papua? It has been a while since Indonesia and the international community decided to look away from the suffering of the people of West Papua. West Papuans continue to be victims of the vested interests of Indonesian colonialism and global capitalism on their land.
Because of those interests, the United Nations and Indonesia have been denying the right of independence to the people of West Papua, a right which should have been granted to them in accordance with General Assembly Resolution 1514, through the Decolonization Committee. Indonesia should welcome the statement of UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon in Auckland, New Zealand, on 7 September 2011, when he stated that the issue of West Papua should be discussed again in the UN decolonization committee, a committee which has several times been chaired by none other than Marty Natalegawa.
This month marks the 30th anniversary of the Lacluta massacre in East Timor by battalions of the Indonesian military, or TNI.
One of the enduring horrors of the occupation of East Timor was the “fence of legs” campaign of 1981 where civilians were rounded up and forcibly marched across the island to flush out resistance fighters – including Xanana Gusmao, now the fledgling nation’s Prime Minister.
Many died along the way. The campaign led to “very serious humanitarian consequences,” including famine as it took place during planting season and many of those press-ganged were subsistence farmers.
The march headed to Lacluta where the UN Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation determined hundreds of East Timorese were murdered by Indonesian armed forces. “The commission received evidence of a large massacre of civilians, including women and children, at this time,” it said.
Indonesian authorities admitted to only 70 deaths, while Martinho da Costa Lopes of East Timor’s Catholic church said the death toll was closer to 500. One East Timorese fighter said the attack was carried out by Battalion 744, later to be commanded by Indonesia’s current president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
“I witnessed with my own eyes how the Indonesian military, Battalion 744, killed civilians in front of me,” Albino da Costa said. “They captured those unarmed people, tied them up then stabbed them to death. There was a pregnant woman captured and killed just like that. I saw it from a close distance, just 100m from where it happened.”
Costa Lopes died in Lisbon in 1991. His repeated calls for intervention by the United Nations and for curtailment of United States military aid to the Indonesian Government went unheeded.
The US, Japan and a number of Western European countries continued to provide Indonesia with about $5 billion in military aid. In the aftermath of the 1975 invasion the media largely ignored, as one Australian parliamentary report called it, “indiscriminate killing on a scale unprecedented in post-World War II history,” because of Indonesia’s vast natural resources. It was, as former US President Richard Nixon put it, the “greatest prize in the Southeast Asian area”.
Indonesia’s occupation of East Timor ended with independence and perhaps as many as a third of the population killed.
But today there is another war for independence in Indonesia: West Papua. And the parallels with East Timor are striking.
Papuans have endured horrific violence since Indonesia first invaded in 1963. Amnesty International and other human rights groups agree that as many as 100,000 Papuans have been killed under occupation.
West Papua is rich in minerals and oil. Transmigration, commercial logging, mining and other government-sponsored programs are considered to be in the interests of the nation, and take priority over any local land claims.
It has the world’s largest gold mine, controlled by the Freeport-McMoRan Company of Louisiana and the Anglo-Australian company Rio Tinto. General Suharto granted the concession under the 1967 foreign investment laws that opened Indonesia to near-unrestricted foreign wealth exploitation.
When guerrillas from the Free West Papua Movement sabotaged the mine in 1977, the army responded by killing at least 800 Papuans. This was not the first, not the last time the Indonesian military would be used to protect Western capital under the guise of “protecting the unity of the nation”. It is happening still.
Grasberg workers walked out on strike over pay and conditions on Wednesday. The mineworkers are paid between $1.50 and $3.50 per hour, less than a tenth of what their colleagues in other countries get, while between April and June 2011 Freeport made a profit of $1.73 billion. Most of the wealth extracted from the mine goes abroad – a tiny percentage benefits Papuans. Two thirds of West Papua’s forests – which are at the heart of Papuans’ traditional way of life – are designated for “production” by Jakarta.
An Indonesian military intelligence report leaked to the press in August showed how the island is awash with spies. And how badly equipped are the Papuan separatists to fight the Indonesian military. The TNI is armed and trained by the US and its allies as part of the East Asia Summit grouping, which is fast developing into a Nato for Asia.
Ahead of the planned Third Papuan Peoples Conference, Indonesian paramilitary forces linked to the police and Special Forces of the army appear to have stepped up military operations in the province, which have been described as a campaign of terror by people on the ground. According to KontraS, The Commission for the Disappeared, the army’s actions are illegal under Indonesian law.
Just like in East Timor before independence, West Papua is a prime example of a colony where the extraction of wealth for the benefit of a few outweighs a people’s fundamental right to self-determination. If atrocities such as the one at Lacluta are to be prevented in the future in West Papua, the TNI should withdraw and international investigators should be allowed access to the region.
Jakarta is at a crossroads with international attention focused on West Papua following the Pacific Islands Forum meetings in New Zealand. The head of the UN Ban Ki Moon was unequivocal when asked about Papua. Papuans’ rights should be upheld, he said. Indonesia’s government could take this opportunity to fulfill its pledge to grant Papuans autonomy. But this must include an end to the lawlessness of government-sponsored armed groups, a withdrawal of army units, and determining how Papuans’ natural resources are used must be the preserve of Papuans.
Timorese students support West Papua. Three arrested in Dili.
A friend in Dili tells ETAN that police recently broke up a demonstration in support of West Papua. As we get more information, we will post updates on ETAN’s blog here.
The morning of August 17, more than 30 Timorese students called for the right of West Papuan to self-determination and condemned human right violation by the Indonesian military and police against Papuans. The demonstration took place in front of Indonesia Embassy in Farol, Dili, on the 66th anniversary of Indonesia’s independence proclamation.
Timor-Leste Police (PNTL) arrested three of the protesters — Juventina Correia Ximenes, Domingos de Andrade and Letornino da Silva. All are currently studying at Timor-Lorosae National University, UNTL.
One of demonstrator, Nolasco Mendes, said that the PNTL treated the activists brutally. Police reportedly arrested the activist after the Indonesia Embassy asked the PNTL to stop the demonstration.
According to a T imornewsline report the pro-Papua protesters were members of the Students Solidarity Council (Dewan Solidaritas Mahasiswa Timor-Leste) which previously fought for Timor-Leste’s independence.
Timor-Leste has a strict law on demonstrations which among other things requires four days notice and bans them within 100 yards of a government or diplomatic building.
The mass uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and other nearby countries have put despotic rulers, human rights abuses and self-determination into our nightly news bulletins and daily conversations in a way that happens very rarely.
The seemingly contagious way these movements for freedom have spread from country to country makes them particularly fascinating, but there is another reason why they have captured the public imagination. It’s because Australians recognise the ‘fair go’ principle, which can also be put in terms of the human right for every person to be safe from harm, to have control over their lives and to have a say in how their country’s run – regardless of whether they live in Bundoora or Benghazi.
In turn, many of us would also be surprised to hear that we have state sponsored violence and political exclusion much closer to home. They would be further surprised to hear these abuses are taking place within Indonesia, a case study for positive social, economic and political reform.
Despite holidaying in Bali, seeing Jakarta on the news or even watching a wildlife documentary shot in the Sumatran jungle, you could be excused for never having heard of West Papua. It comprises the western half of the island of New Guinea (the eastern half belongs to Papua New Guinea) and a collection of small islands.
West Papua’s landscape is one of tropical islands, coconut strewn beaches, impenetrable rain forests and rugged snow capped mountain peaks. It is home to around three million people, including some of the last remaining humans still untouched by the modern world.
West Papua’s modern history is marked by exploitation and resilience. Colonial explorers claimed it as Dutch territory in the 1600s, the Japanese and Americans made it a key battleground of World War II and the newly independent Indonesian nation invaded and forcibly occupied the territory in 1962, just 13 years before they would do the same in East Timor.
In the 50 years since then, West Papua has been ruled as a country-apart within Indonesia. This is somewhat ironic given West Papua is physically, culturally and historically separate from the rest of Indonesia. Its traditional ties run east and south to Papua New Guinea, Melanesia, northern Australia and the Pacific.
Where military and police abuses were curtailed elsewhere, they were encouraged in West Papua. While ‘unity in diversity’ was the national motto, West Papuan traditional culture was violently suppressed and almost a million ‘transmigrants’ were shipped in and given the reigns of local government and the economy. Even as the post-Suharto human rights reforms resulted in greater freedom of speech for those in Jakarta, incarceration or death are still the standard penalties for raising the Morning Star flag in West Papua. An estimated 100,000 local people have been killed during the occupation.
In 2007 I travelled from East Timor through Indonesia, West Papua and Papua New Guinea on my way back to Australia. My lasting memories are of friendly West Papuans inviting me into their homes to practice English with their children and heavily armed military personnel/police stopping me in the street for seemingly random questioning. When I returned to Melbourne, I met members of the West Papuan refugee community here and learned more about the extent of the abuses taking place in their homeland.
A recent example captured on video and shared on the internet, shows two Papuan men being cruelly tortured by security forces, including one having his genitals burnt. Other examples include activists being shot at demonstrations – or just disappearing. Local prisons are full of political prisoners who have committed no crime other than raising their voice.
It is also important to differentiate this critique of state sponsored human rights abuses and a lack of self-determination from a more general attack on Indonesia as a nation or its culture.
As someone who speaks Indonesian moderately well and has lived and travelled in the region, I know first hand the beautiful diversity within Indonesia’s awe inspiring 17,500 island archipelago. The majority of its 240 million people are not disputing their place in this nation state and democratic, social, economic and political progress continues in most areas.
Nevertheless, acknowledging Indonesia’s strengths is not the same as writing a blank cheque to the worst elements within its military and government. After 24 years of silence, Australia finally found the moral and political strength to take a stand on behalf of the East Timorese people and this is what is needed again, not just from our Prime Minister Julia Gillard, but from other world leaders within our region and right across the globe.
We all know that international diplomacy can be a dirty business where economic and political interests take precedence over doing what is right. We should acknowledge that it is politics and economics that are the key barriers blocking the Australian government from advocating on behalf of the West Papuan people. There is no easy villain such as Muammar Gaddafi to hold up as a symbol of evil. It’s more complicated than that.
International diplomacy can also be a powerful force for improving lives. While East Timor remains poor, I didn’t meet a single person there who wanted to go back to Indonesian rule. Australia is a regional leader, particularly in the areas of good governance and human rights protection, and we should not shy away from this role. We have the power to make a difference in West Papua and, in turn, we carry the corresponding responsibility to do so.
If we simply cast our gaze to distant parts of the world, where people are paying with their lives for basic freedoms, we will overlook those closer to home paying with their own lives for those same freedoms.
As YouTube evidence of Indonesian soldiers burning the genitals of the West Papuan Tunaliwor Kiwo received its 50,000th viewer, the Indonesian military (TNI) was exposed holding a cynical mock trial to try to cover up systemic violence.
Julia Gillard was red-faced. When in Indonesia with Barack Obama last month, she had praised President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s quick response and the coming trial. Soldiers from another, lesser ”abuse case” were then paraded and given soft sentences, while Kiwo’s torturers remain on active duty.
Despite the Australian embassy in Jakarta telling Indonesian officials of Australia’s “unhappiness with the military’s investigation”, the blatant contempt shown for Gillard and her officials creates little confidence.
Gillard bit her tongue again this week. ”The President of Indonesia,” she said, ”has made it absolutely clear he wants to see any wrongdoers brought to justice on this matter.”
Where’s the solidarity that lifted East Timor out of the geopolitical rubbish bin and into the minds of mainstream Aussies? In 1999 East Timor held a United Nations referendum, due in part to international and Australian pressure, and the Indonesian military tortured, raped and scorched its way back to Java.
In that year in West Papua I discovered the best kept secret in the Asia-Pacific region. Hiking among the highland farms of the Dani people, I heard stories of dispossession, detention, torture and murder. Yale University suggests that since the Indonesian military invaded in 1962-63, it has killed 400,000 West Papuans yet few Australians know anything about these killing fields.
I had lived and travelled on and off in Indonesia for 15 years but never heard even a whisper from West Papua. I departed shocked by the locals’ stories and with a growing suspicion that we were being lied to. The Australian government has always known what’s happening there but has chosen placation over human dignity and moral leadership.
Back in Australia, it was as if this province of 2.6 million had been erased. Why the silence? Where are the churches, students and humanitarian groups who fought for East Timor? Where are the unions who boycotted the Dutch in Indonesia and the regime in South Africa? Where are the conservatives who beat their chests after John Howard ”saved East Timor”?
History offers a clue. When General Suharto took power in Indonesia in 1965-66, he opened the floodgates to Western resource companies. Every Australian government since Menzies kowtowed to this murderous bully, partially to ward off the feared disintegration of this 18,000-island republic, but mainly to gain access to Indonesia’s vast natural resources.
The first Western company to do business with Suharto was the Freeport goldmine in West Papua. Partly owned by Australia’s Rio Tinto, it is the largest gold and copper mine in the world and Indonesia’s biggest taxpayer. Yet West Papuans live in poverty, experiencing the worst health, education and development levels in Indonesia.
Freeport’s $4 billion profit last year didn’t come easily. Dr Damien Kingsbury of Deakin University says the local Amungme people ”have been kicked out, they’ve been given a token payment and if they’ve protested, they’ve been shot”.
None of this would have been possible without Freeport’s paid protection from the TNI, which gets two-thirds of its military budget from its own private businesses. This conflict of interest is at the heart of the military’s ongoing human rights abuses. How can it serve the country while serving itself? West Papua has necessarily become a resource cash cow, a military fiefdom 3000 kilometres from Jakarta, full of tribally divided, uneducated farmers, sitting atop a new El Dorado.
Despite journalists still being banned, West Papua is no longer the secret it was in 1999. Gillard should not be placated by Indonesia’s mock trial of torturers nor train them, in the form of Kopassus. We should work with Jakarta to reform the military and open up West Papua to international scrutiny. It’s time for Australia to step up for our tortured and murdered neighbours to the north.
Charlie Hill-Smith is the writer-director of Strange Birds in Paradise – A West Papuan Story, which is nominated for four AFI Awards including best documentary.
In his autobiography Dreams from My Father, Barack Obama recalls a conversation with his stepfather who had just returned home after a tour of duty with the Indonesian military in West Papua. On asking him: “Have you ever seen a man killed?”, his stepfather recounted the bloody death of “weak” men.
Last month, video footage circulated online showing members of the Indonesian security forces brutally torturing Papuan civilians, including burning the genitals of an elderly farmer. It seems as far as West Papua is concerned, some things never change.
Earlier this year, the US administration announced the re-establishment of military ties with Indonesia’s Kopassus special forces – the same forces implicated in the atrocities of East Timor. Leaked Kopassus documents released last week, have heightened fears that Indonesia’s claims of military reform – a condition of the US deal – are without foundation. The documents show that Kopassus continue to engage in “murder and abduction” and include a target list of “enemies of the Indonesian state”, including West Papuan church leaders, political and student activists.
Last year I travelled to West Papua to film an undercover documentary about the independence struggle. I found a land where the remnants of the Suharto era very much live on into the modern day – far from the image of democracy that Obama painted in his speech to the Indonesian nation.
Reports of human rights abuses by the security forces against the indigenous population have constantly trickled out of the territory. Human rights groups estimate that 100,000 Papuan civilians have been killed by the Indonesian security forces since West Papua was colonised in 1969. Papuans argue that the continued ban on foreign media and human rights groups from entering the region is evidence that the Indonesian authorities are hiding something far more sinister. Last year the International Committee of the Red Cross was expelled from West Papua, and it has not been allowed to return since.
In West Papua it is not uncommon for people to receive prison sentences of up to 15 years for raising their national flag. Even events here in the UK can land Papuans a jail sentence. Last year, two men were jailed after taking part in a peaceful demonstration supporting the launch of a West Papua lobby group in the British parliament. Whatever definition of democracy the Indonesian government claims exists in West Papua, it is not one that any of us would be familiar.
The challenges facing West Papua are vast. Despite being a land rich in natural resources, it remains the least developed and poorest part of Indonesia. Freeport, the world’s largest gold and copper mine, part-owned by British-Australian firm Rio Tinto, is located on tribal lands close to Puncak Jaya, the highest island peak in the world. BP also has its feet in West Papua, too, operating a natural gas plant in Bintuni Bay. It is an irony that in a land so rich, the Papuan people remain so poor.
Obama’s refusal to publicly raise the West Papua issue during his visit to Indonesia disappointed many. The Indonesian government have shown no desire to enter into meaningful dialogue with the Papuan people, and bitterness and resentment are threatening to boil over. Many Papuans believe only UN intervention and a rerun of the 1969 referendum will solve the decades-long conflict.
If the horrors of East Timor are to be avoided, then the US and other western governments need to give West Papua the attention it deserves. Obama’s mother, a cultural anthropologist who spent much of her life helping those marginalised in society, would expect nothing less.
Groups Urge Obama Administration to Reject Dino Patti Djalal as Indonesia’s Ambassador
Contact: John M. Miller (ETAN) 718-596-7668
Ed McWilliams (WPAT) 401-568-5845 (until Sept. 21), 575-648-2078 (after)
The East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) and West Papua Advocacy Team (WPAT) are deeply concerned about the appointment of Dino Patti Djalal as the Indonesia’s Ambassador-designate to the United States. We urge President Obama to reject his credentials and urge Jakarta to send an Ambassador untainted by complicity with human rights violations and with greater credibility.
Ambassador Djalal was a defender of the Suharto dictatorship, and his career involved him in brutal repression. While defending the Indonesian security forces in East Timor (now independent Timor-Leste), he would often attack human rights investigators and organizations. He sought to portray the violence there as civil conflict among East Timorese, rather than resulting from repression of resistance to Indonesia’s illegal and brutal occupation.
The Suharto dictatorship and the Habibie government that followed promoted Djalal as Indonesia’s leading “expert” on East Timor. During that time, Djalal reportedly had close links with the Indonesian army’s intelligence agency.
In 1999, during and after East Timor’s historic UN-organized vote on independence, Djalal was based in East Timor as the spokesperson for the Satgas P3TT (the Indonesian “Task Force for Popular Consultation in East Timor”). In that capacity he took the lead in the Task Force’s political initiatives.
As Task Force spokesman, Djalal quickly emerged as its leading political heavyweight, taking the lead in leveling false accusations against UNAMET (UN Assistance Mission for East Timor). In his official capacity Djalal also served as flack for the militias created and directed by the Indonesian military to terrorize the East Timorese population in the run-up to August 1999 vote. Those militias and their Indonesian security force allies repeatedly attacked East Timorese civilians, burning villages and assaulting churches in attempt to frighten the population into voting against independence. The militias also sought to intimidate the UN teams sent to prepare for the vote and the international media and humanitarian organizations in the country to monitor the process.
As international alarm over the excesses of the militias and their Indonesian military sponsors grew, Djalal played a key role in seeking to deflect criticism of the militias and the military.
Djalal denied the reality that militias were arming in the run-up to the vote and sought to obscure militia and military atrocities against civilians in East Timor. He was a dogged critic of international journalists and human right organizations who sought to report these atrocities.
In the wake of East Timor’s overwhelming vote for independence, the Indonesian security forces and their militias rampaged throughout country exacting revenge for the people’s rejection of Jakarta’s rule. The militia and military attacks destroyed vital infrastructure and buildings. They targeted UN facilities and personnel, as well as international journalists, diplomats and other observers. Djalal was key in Jakarta’s unsuccessful efforts to deny the reality of the which cost the lives of approximately 1,500 East Timorese, displaced two-thirds of its population, and destroyed 75 percent of East Timor’s infrastructure.
In diplomatic assignments in the U.S., Great Britain and Canada, Djalal focused on defending the role of the unreformed and abusive Indonesian military, including targeting of its foreign critics. More recently he has served as Presidential spokesperson.
Ambassador Djalal’s past as an apologist for the worst behavior of the Indonesian military and its minions augers poorly for international efforts, especially in the United States, to press for justice and accountability for past human rights crimes and genuine reform of Indonesia’s security forces. As the situation in West Papua becomes increasingly tense, will Djalal serve as Indonesia’s Washington-based apologist for continued repression?
In the interest of promoting strengthened U.S.-Indonesian relations based on respect for human rights, ETAN and WPAT believe that the U.S. government should not accept Djalal’s credentials as Indonesia’s Ambassador to the United States.
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Papuans Behind Bars
http://www.papuansbehindbars.org , a new project to document the cases of West Papuan Political prisoners. That site has profiles of current and former political prisoners and releases monthly news updates on arrests, trials etc
Photo: West Papua Media Alerts
Photo: West Papua Media Alerts
Photo: West Papua Media Alerts
As YouTube evidence of Indonesian soldiers burning the genitals of the West Papuan Tunaliwor Kiwo received its 50,000th viewer, the Indonesian military (TNI) was exposed holding a cynical mock trial to try to cover up systemic violence.
In his autobiography Dreams from My Father, Barack Obama recalls a conversation with his stepfather who had just returned home after a tour of duty with the Indonesian military in West Papua. On asking him: “Have you ever seen a man killed?”, his stepfather recounted the bloody death of “weak” men.
