Imagine taking a trip to West Papua. Not the independent nation of Papua New Guinea (PNG) which occupies the eastern half of the island of New Guinea, but the western half, governed by Indonesia, a place that has had numerous names in a short space of time.
It was called Netherlands New Guinea from 1895 to 1962, after which it was variously—and officially—called West Irian, Irian Jaya and West Papua. In 2000 the whole area was re-named Papua, but then in 2003 it was divided into two provinces, Papua and West Papua. In June 2022 it was divided again into three more areas: South Papua, Central Papua and Highland Papua. Establishing more provinces is a tactic of divide and rule. It means more troops, more military posts, and more district commands in the newly created provinces. Constant changes of name coupled with difficulty of access for outside scrutiny makes West Papua one of the world’s least understood regions. There are people, including Australians, who either know nothing of it or confuse it with PNG, and yet the capital, Jayapura, is just over 4000 km from Canberra, not too much farther than Canberra is from Perth.
You need not consider going there if you’re a journalist, a humanitarian or human rights worker because it is highly unlikely that you will be allowed in. You may begin to wonder why such restrictions apply to a place so close to Australia. An internet search would present information about West Papua, but the large, powerful Australian news outlets are silent and rarely comment on the restrictions on journalism so close to home. In West Papua itself most newspapers and printed media are controlled by the Indonesian government, and the few private outlets suffer harassment and threat. Foreign media has little access, and should any manage entrance to West Papua, they are strictly monitored.
Sensing something radically wrong, you might begin to read internet reports. These make it plain that Papuans are facing erasure as a people. You read that tens of thousands are fleeing to the relative safety of PNG, escaping from a brutal regime and its extreme effects on their society.
If you go on to learn some of the background you find that for centuries the Dutch East Indies covered the great archipelago above Australia, except for Portuguese Timor, and embraced the western half of the island of New Guinea. In deference to the enormous cultural, ethnic and geographical differences of the people in West Papua, the Dutch began preparing them for independence throughout the 1950s, culminating in a congress in 1961. The congress adopted the Morning Star flag as the symbol of the emerging nation, and it was first raised on 1 December that year. Dutch colonisation throughout the remainder of the archipelago was thrown off in 1949 and the Republic of Indonesia was born, growing into a modern and generally cohesive democracy.
The United Nations initially controlled West Papua and then handed the administration to Indonesia in preparation for independence. The instrument for this arrangement, the New York Agreement of August 1962, declares in Article XVIII:
Indonesia will make arrangements, with the assistance and participation of the United Nation Representative and his staff, to give the people of the territory the opportunity to exercise freedom of choice.
The exercise of that ‘freedom of choice’ was planned for 1969, but many Papuans were wary, and rightly so. Here is an account of some Australian involvement:
In 1969, at the request of Indonesia, Australian officials stopped two pro-independence West Papuan leaders from travelling to the United Nations, just weeks before the so-called Act of Free Choice. The two political leaders from West Papua, Clemens Runawery and Wilhelm Zongganao, were sent to New York from Jayapura carrying testimonies from West Papuan leaders calling for independence and petitions imploring the United Nations secretary general to halt the UN-supervised vote on Dutch New Guinea’s political status. Arriving in the Australian administered territory of New Guinea en route to the United States, the two West Papuan leaders were halted, questioned by ASIO officers, and then held in detention on Manus Island. As the United Nations stood back and allowed the sham consultation to proceed, their voice could not be heard in New York.
That sham consultation was held by the Indonesian government between 14 July and 2 August 1969, taking the form of a selection by the Indonesian military of a small number of supposed representatives. The 1025 people selected were to vote on behalf of the other 800,000 Papuans. They voted unanimously in favour of Indonesian control.
Participants in that bogus act have told their stories. One, a member of the local parliament set up by the Dutch in a certain district, was aware of the increase in Indonesian military personnel in the area and heard them telling people not to raise the Morning Star flag. This person was required to live in another residence for two weeks before the vote without communication with anyone from the outside, including family. The day arrived for the Act of Free Choice to be accepted in that district. It consisted of a statement written by the military declaring that Papua was part of Indonesia. The person was taken into a hall and told to read the statement over a loudspeaker. Other Papuans in the hall listened to what was read, and faced with the armed soldiers standing around the walls, raised their hands in agreement. People outside who were listening shouted their opposition and were set upon by the military and chased into the jungle.
That was the method used to promulgate the ‘Act of Free Choice’ all over West Papua. The people call it the ‘Act of No Choice’. The disgrace of UN involvement in such a farce far exceeds any flimsy legitimacy it may have hoped to provide.
Human Rights
Since then, the Papuan people have become strangers in their own land. Government-sponsored migration to the territory has greatly increased the number of Indonesian residents whose numbers now equal the Indigenous people. Papuans lack proper representation at all levels of government.
If you were admitted to the region, Papuans could tell you of military court processes where people who had been attending the court in civilian clothes suddenly reappear in military uniform. You could be told of a wealthy young man who built offices for one of the Papuan independence groups and was then found poisoned. Intimidating SMS messages are sent daily to an independence supporter. Meetings of people in their own homes can be broken up by officials or military. People are warned not to build relationships with outsiders. Workers in a palm oil company complained because they had not been paid for two months and the military came and tortured them. You may hear of incidents in the markets where the police or military in civilian clothes run motorcycles into stalls as though by accident.
The gross human rights violations against Papuans are confronting. Since 1963, when Indonesia took over, hundreds of thousands of people have died violently. Indonesian anti-terror units are funded by the international community, including Australia, but in West Papua they are used to search for political activists, especially those agitating for independence. Indonesia now treats Papuan political acts as terrorism. Papuans are jailed for raising the Morning Star flag.
The Indonesian military
Delving further into West Papuan history, you will come to realise that the Indonesian government, through its military, enables these human rights violations of the Papuan people. However, its lack of complete success is illustrated both by the continued Papuan resistance and the evidence of great numbers of people escaping the military and the chaos which their presence brings. Human rights experts appointed by the UN state that 60,000 West Papuan internal refugees have been created by military operations in the highlands, many fleeing to the forests or to other regions, and there are at least 10,000 in PNG.
The exact number of Indonesian troops in West Papua has not been officially disclosed by Indonesia but appears to be in the tens of thousands. West Papua is the most militarised area of the archipelago. Political demonstrations are met with military dispersal and the arrest of attendees. Civil society, activist and even church group meetings are spied on and often disrupted by state agents. As foreigners are vetted by Jakarta before being granted permission to enter West Papua, journalists, aid workers and even diplomats are prevented from witnessing the blanket militarisation of the region.
Chillingly, the overwhelming military presence throughout the territory reaches even into schools. Military personnel in uniform fill teacher shortages and serve to instil into the children a sense of Indonesian nationality at the expense of Papuan identity and languages. They gather valuable information on the local people’s attitudes and quash pro-Papuan sentiments. The presence of the military in classrooms traumatises students to the extent of inhibiting their learning. It is indoctrination, contributing to the creeping genocide that has been the reality in West Papua during the decades of Indonesian control.
Resource wealth
Once you realise the extent of the rich resources of West Papua it all begins to make sense: the militarism, the secrecy, the refusal to admit human rights monitors, the compliant silence of regional neighbours such as Australia. Massive projects reaping the gold, silver, copper, timber, coal, oil and natural gas bring enormous wealth to Indonesia.
West Papua is home to the Grasberg mine, one of the largest copper and gold mines in the world, worth an estimated $US 100 billion. It is managed by PT Freeport Indonesia (PTFI), affiliated with the US Freeport McMoRan company, with Indonesia owning 51 per cent of the mine as well as receiving the tax revenue. Other companies operating lucrative mines in West Papua include RTZ, formed by the merger of the Anglo-Australian company Rio Tinto (RTC) and the Consolidated Zinc Corporation (CZ). The profits of British Petroleum and its subsidiary BP Australia are in the billions of dollars. Another huge gold deposit has been found recently in the western highlands, considered to be worth $US 40 billion. A gas field is set to yield $US 10 billion.
You might expect that such a rich land would bring benefits to the people who live there, but you would soon realise that education is poor and standards are low. Although there are many school buildings, quality education is lacking. Some companies have foundations to educate people at the company’s expense, but it is usually the children of officials who receive the support, not village children. All the curricula and teaching materials are designed to enforce the idea that Papuans are one community with the people of Kalimantan, Sumatra and other places in Indonesia, although Papuans are ethnically Melanesian and receive support for their independence struggle from Pacific nations, particularly Vanuatu. The Melanesian Spearhead Group comprising Fiji, PNG, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu work together in trade and cultural cooperation. West Papua has applied for full membership, but Indonesia’s observer status is a critical stumbling block.
If you actually arrived in West Papua you would find that the government concentrates only on Indonesian economic development and ignores the people’s rights. Papuans want to be actors in the economic life of their land. They have initiated ventures to help themselves, but it is difficult to get credit. You might hear someone say: ‘As soon as they see that I am black and have curly hair they will not lend to me’.
You may meet a group of women from rural areas selling their goods on the footpath. You would learn that their practice is to hire a van for three days, pack it with the produce they have grown, and travel to the city to sell it. They bring their children with them and live in the van for three days. Then they go home, return the van, and set about working in their gardens to prepare for the next week’s trip.
You would find that many Papuan mothers and babies die for various reasons, including accidents, even in hospitals. You would hear people saying that hospitals are places for dying, not healing, as there are too few nurses and doctors offering very limited services. In emergency departments, non-Papuans get preferential treatment. You will be told that the government provides everyone with an Indonesian Health Card, by which citizens can get free health treatment. But low literacy levels make the paperwork too difficult for many Papuans to access the benefits.
You now know why Australian governments of all stripes rarely comment on the situation. Fearful of upsetting Indonesia or challenging the source of company profits, they acquiesce to the regime and remain complicit. This unspoken policy ensures that Australia remains in lockstep with the United States, which for decades has fawned on Indonesia both as a sprawling non-communist presence in Southeast Asia and as a reliable buffer to China. For all its fanfare of independence, Australia is dutifully meek on the Papuan issue, mirroring the meekness of its relationship with both the United States and highly influential Australian corporations.
So, it is just as well you are not a journalist because you would not be able to fulfil your duties in West Papua. You might, by now, have even given up the idea of going there at all. But having read this, you might consider reading reports, viewing documentaries, writing letters for the Papuan people, our near neighbours.
Will you use your voice for them?
NB. The references to Papuan comments in the article are disguised for fear of repercussions on those Papuans with whom she spoke.