Tag: Papua

Tapol: Britain and Indonesia – Too close for comfort?

TAPOL Press release
President’s visit prompts fresh concerns about arms sales and training of anti-terror police

30 October 201

British-funded training of Indonesia’s anti-terror police, Special Detachment 88, should be reviewed in the light of serious concerns about the unit’s human rights record and its operations in Papua, says TAPOL ahead of a state visit to London by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono from 31 October to 2 November 2012.

In the run-up to the visit TAPOL, which promotes human rights, peace and democracy in Indonesia, is also appealing for an immediate ban on the sale to Indonesia of any military equipment that may be used for internal repression.

“While British businesses are no doubt eagerly anticipating the President’s visit, victims of human rights abuses will derive little comfort from the prospect of increased arms sales and ongoing training of Indonesian security forces,” says Paul Barber, Coordinator of TAPOL.

As the UK government prepares a state welcome for President Yudhoyono, rights groups from the UK and beyond are organizing an alternative welcome at a demonstration on behalf of the victims of human rights abuses outside Downing Street from 13:00 to 14:30 on Wednesday 31 October.

While Indonesia has made substantial progress in its transition from dictatorship to democracy since the downfall of former President Suharto in May 1998, serious human rights concerns remain.

“The news that the President is to receive a prestigious honour from the Queen is a gross affront to those who have suffered violations at the hands of successive Indonesian governments,” said Barber [1].

Special Detachment 88, known as ‘Densus 88’ was formed after the Bali bombings in 2002 to combat terrorism, but is reportedly being deployed to tackle other issues, such as alleged separatism in Indonesia’s conflict-affected provinces. Local civil society monitors say Densus 88 is being used to crack down on the Papuan independence movement, and the unit has been implicated in the assassination of its leaders, such as Mako Tabuni who was shot dead in June this year.

The unit is trained at the Jakarta Centre for Law Enforcement Cooperation, JCLEC, which received a minimum of £400,000 in funding from Britain in the financial year 2011/12, as well as training provided by British officers. These include the UK’s South East Asia Counter Terrorism & Extremism Liaison Officer Detective Superintendent Phil Tucker; former Metropolitan Police Commander Bob Milton, and David Gray, an officer from the Counter Terrorism Command at New Scotland Yard who sits on JCLEC’s Board of Supervisors and has been teaching on the course since August 2009.

In July this year, leading Indonesian human rights NGO, KontraS, published research which stated that Densus 88 operations commonly involved arbitrary arrest and detention, torture, physical abuse and injury causing death [2].

Indonesia has been identified by the UK as a priority market for defence sales, with Prime Minister David Cameron boosting the export effort when he visited Jakarta with arms company executives in April 2012. The value of approved arms export licences has risen dramatically under the coalition government. The use of British equipment such as Hawk jets, armoured personnel carriers and water cannon for internal repression has been widely documented over the years and was acknowledged by the British Government in the 1990s. UK Tactica vehicles have been used to crush protest on the streets of Jakarta as recently as March this year, and are used by Indonesia’s notorious paramilitary police unit Brimob.

During the President’s visit, groups including TAPOL, Down to Earth, Survival International, Progressio and Christian Solidarity Worldwide will be highlighting these and other key issues, including Human Rights in Papua; The Need for Dialogue in Papua; Freedom of Expression; Rights, Livelihoods and Climate Justice; Religious Intolerance; and Timor-Leste and Impunity.

Information on these issues is set out in a briefing available here.

ENDS

Contact: Paul Barber on 01420 80153 / 07747 301 739 or Esther Cann on 07503 400 308.

Notes:

1. President Yudhoyono will reportedly be awarded the Knights Grand Cross of the Order of Bath by the Queen during his visit.

2. KontraS report on Densus 88 available from TAPOL on request

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Update on Manokwari police beating of journalist Oktovianus Pogau

Statement/ Media safety briefing from Oktovianus Pogau, SuaraPapua.com

October 27, 2012

I (Oktovianus Pogau, a journalist at suarapapua.com and a freelancer for The Jakarta Globe) will report on a beating that I experienced, perpetrated by police in Manokwari, West Papua.

Journalist Oktovianus Pogau (Photo: Andreas Harsono)

On the 24th October, 2012, at around 16.00 Eastern Indonesian Time, I was accompanied by three journalists, two from Cahaya Papua (Duma Sanda and Patrick Tandilerung) and one journalist from Tabloid Noken (Jo Kelwulan) to Manokwari police station to meet with the Chief of Police for Manokwari, AKBP Agustinus Supriyanto S.Ik, as had been arranged on the evening of Tuesday (23/10) with the officer.

The Chief of Police had initially stated that he was not aware if members of the force had beat up journalists, then, when many journalists from Jakarta began to call the station inquiring about the incident, Supriyanto became adamant that there were no beatings of journalists by police.
Then, continued Supriyanto, 5-10 minutes later at around 20.00 Eastern Indonesian Time, there was a brief message from me to his phone (whereas I sent him an SMS at 13.29 WIT, 30 minutes after the beating) which stated that there had been a beating and that my neck had been strangled while I was covering an action by Komite Nasional Papua Barat (KNPB) (National West Papuan Committee) on Tuesday 23/10 in front of Kampus Universitas Negeri Papua (Unipa) (Papuan State University) which was supporting an international lawyers meeting in London.

Then, the Chief of Police conveyed himself as the supervisor and manager of all the police in Manokwari, Papua Barat, and didn’t question that the media publish (when shown the news headlines in Cahaya Papua which detailed the violence perpetrated by members of the police force against me) news about the aforementioned incident.

Supriyanto said that the relationships between all journalists in West Papua, particularly in Manokwari, is really good, and because of this, he personally regrets the incident of the beating, and in fact, was surprised that a member of the force would do something like this to a journalist.

Supriyanto said that he wished to offer a personal apology for the incident. He also said that there was also a possibility that the incident occurred because the police didn’t realise I was a journalist, and that they were also carried away with the emotion of the moment.

Because of this, the Chief of Police firmly requested that I identify the men responsible for the incident so they could be subject to due legal processes, as in line with my request.

However, Supriyanto also suggested that the case didn’t have to be resolved amicably, that is, to be resolved by making peace with the offenders. According to the chief of police, it could be a rather difficult process to find the offenders, as there were many members in the force, and certainly no-one would be honest, but he said again that it depended on me.

After the chief of police opened this conversation, he gave us all the chance to talk. Duma Sanda explained that there was an issue of freedom of the press, in which the work of journalists is universal, meaning, it doesn’t mean that just because I didn’t live and become a journalist in Manokwari, I didn’t have the right to cover the demonstration by KNPB.

Duma also firmly requested that the Chief of Police teach the men to respect the profession of journalism, and also to respect journalists like myself. And, to make himself clearer, Duma also requested that the Chief listen to a chronological account of the beating I experienced.

I introduced myself (officially) to the Chief of Police.  I told him about my work writing news for the paper Papua Pos Nabire and Tabloid JUBI during high school, about writing several columns in Tabloid Suara Perempuan Papua, the newspaper Bintang Papua, along with Papua Pos Nabire.  And I conveyed to him that I’d also covered stories for The Jakarta Globe and that this is still continuing, and then that I established suarapapua.com as an online media outlet.

I explained to the Chief of Police in chronological order the incident of the beating (you can read my previous email). After this, I conveyed a number of important issues to the Chief of Police that have to be understood about the incident of the beating.

I said that firstly, his men had violated the article KUHP on disorder; secondly, the men had violated article UU Kebebasan Pers 1999 (UU on Freedom of the Press 1999) by preventing the work of a journalist; thirdly the UU anti-discrimination; and fourthly, Intelligence didn’t have the authority to capture let alone beat someone and certainly they violated their work code.

Because of this, I requested that the problem not be resolved amicably/peacefully, but should be followed up through a more direct process of law. I said that it was important that the police officers be aware, and law enforcement officers should be an example, that if there are officers who are at fault, then they have to be punished as criminals so that the public can know.

Oktovianus Pogau

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Papuan independence demo in London

Bintang Papua
25 October 2012 Benny Wenda leads an Independence Demo in London

Jayapura: Three British Members of Parliament were present at a meeting which was held in one of the committee rooms in the House of Commons for two hours on 23 October  at which information was given about the situation in West Papua.

The three parliamentarians were Andrew Smith, MP, member  for Oxford, Lord Harris a member of the House of Lords and Dan Rogerson MP, member for Cornwall.

While the meeting was in progress, a group of a dozen or more supporters of the OPM, the Papuan Freedom Organisation, held a demonstration outside, led by Benny Wenda, leader of the West Papuan.organisation overseas, who also addressed the demo. One of the demands made by the speaker was for the United Nations to send an observer mission to West Papua.

[The report is accompanied by a photo of the demonstration, which also shows the Morning  Star flag.]

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Warinussy: Poor Protection of Human Rights Defenders in Indonesia

by Yan Christian Warinussy

Opinion

October 25, 2012

The Government of Indonesia is lacking political commitment and has failed to take a clear stand in providing a safe, comfortable working environment for human rights defenders in Indonesia. They are not protected while carrying out their professional activities in various areas in Indonesia, particularly in conflict areas such as the Land of Papua (Papua and West Papua).

This has been proved by various types of physical intimidation towards human rights workers in the Land of Papua such as Theo Hesegem (an activist from the Papua Peace Network in Wamena), Peneas Lokbere (Coordinator of BUK in Jayapura), lawyer Olga Helen Hamadi (Coordinator of KontraS Papua in Jayapura), Fanny Kogoya (Coordinator of Walhi Papua in Jayapura) and most recently Octovianus Pogau (an online media journalist for Papuan Voice and contributor for an English language media outlet based in Jakarta), who was intimidated by members of the Manokwari police force last Tuesday (23/10).

Theo Hesegem received the same threats as those received by Peneas Lokbere and Olga Hamadi; they were visited and threatened with violence, as they undertook advocacy in relation to various cases where human rights violations have been indicated in Jayapura and Wamena. Fanny Kogoya has received some extremely brutal threats; her house has been ransacked, and it was suspected that this was carried out by police intelligence agents, in complete disregard of the law and human rights principles laid out in the Code of Criminal Procedure. Oktovianus Pogau in Manokwari was attacked by police forces from Manokwari Police District Command as he carried out his journalistic work following the KNPB demo on Tuesday (23/10) in front of the UNIPA campus in Amban, Manokwari.

As a Papuan human rights defender myself, I want to emphasise that the state is responsible for providing protection to all citizens of the country – in particular human rights defenders – from terror, threats and intimidation. The responsibility of the State is clearly laid out in article 28)4 of the 1945 Constitution which says “protection, promotion, enforcement and fulfilment of human rights is the responsibility of the state, primarily the Government.” The state is therefore responsible for fulfilling the right to freedom from fear, and this is not restricted for human rights defenders.

In connection with this, Papuan human rights defenders and all activists from non-governmental organisations who carry out humanitarian, human rights and justice work for civil society in Papua and West Papua will be undertaking consolidation work together. We will resist, legally, those actions of the state which are being used by unprofessional members of the security forces.

In particular, as regards the case of Octovianus Pogau in Manokwari, I urge the Head of Manokwari District Police force to receive the young Papuan journalist in question to file a police report, and carry out a prompt investigation in accordance with the mechanisms and legal procedure laid out in the Code of Criminal Procedure (Law 8, 1981), so that the perpetrator can be punished in accordance with his actions.

Yan Christian Warinussy

Executive Director of LP3Bh Manokwari/Human Rights Defender in the Land of Papua/ Member of the Steering Committee of FOKER in the Land of Papua
Translated by TAPOL

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Papuan deaths reported in crackdown

24 Oct 2012

By Stefan Armbruster

Download Episode Duration00:04:53     2MB

There are unconfirmed reports of deaths during a crackdown against independence activists in the Papuan provinces of Indonesia.

Indonesian television has shown security forces firing weapons and beating people while breaking up a rally in the town of Manokwari.

Authorities say they were provoked by stone throwers, a number of its troops were injured and that they only fired into the air as a warning.

Human rights monitors and foreign media are restricted by the Indonesian government from entering the region but one local journalist reported he was bashed by security forces.

Greens spokesman for West Papua Senator Richard Di Natale told Stefan Armbruster the Australian Government needs to speak up about the issue.

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