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Letter to Ian Pearson on violence in West Papua

Tapol - March 17, 2006

Ian Pearson MP
Minister of State
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London SW1A 1AA

17 March 2006

Dear Mr Pearson,

We very much appreciated the opportunity of meeting you yesterday with the All-Party Parliamentary Group on West Papua.

Regrettably, as you know, the meeting coincided with an outbreak of serious violence in the West Papuan capital Jayapura, which resulted in the deaths of three police officers and an air force officer and serious injuries to several civilians. The violence occurred when police attempted to break up a student demonstration outside Cenderawasih University against the US-owned Freeport copper-and-gold mine in West Papua.

We are grateful to you for undertaking to ask the UK embassy in Jakarta to monitor the situation closely and to urge the Indonesian authorities to exercise restraint in their response, especially in their treatment of any students and others they arrest or encounter in the course of their operations. We have today received reports from local sources that police have shot at student dormitories around the university and beaten Papuans they have detained and interrogated.

We believe there is a grave danger that the situation could escalate and that the security forces will be motivated by revenge instead of the legitimate pursuit of justice. Unfortunately, the climate of impunity which exists in West Papua facilitates and encourages a response that involves arbitrary reprisals against Papuans. We are mindful of the extra-judicials killings and acts of torture against students which took place in similar circumstances after the Abepura incident in December 2000 for which no-one in authority has yet been held to account.

Please caution the authorities against arbitrary arrests and detentions and remind them of their obligation to fully respect the rights of detainees, including their right of access to a lawyer.

The severe restrictions on access to West Papua also encourage an expectation of impunity by the security forces. At yesterday's meeting, we questioned why the UK embassy in Jakarta last year blocked the visit of an Ambassadorial level EU Troika mission to West Papua. You kindly agreed to look into that. We urge you to explore the possibility of reviving such a mission and of arranging an immediate visit by embassy officials to investigate yesterday's incident and the underlying causes of the Papuans' anger, which has prompted numerous anti-Freeport demonstrations in recent weeks.

Please also urge the Indonesian authorities to lift any restrictions and other obstacles in the way of unhindered access to West Papua by journalists, human rights monitors, and non-governmental organisations.

Reports indicate that the violence occurred when the police attempted to move several hundred students who were blocking the road outside the university. When that failed, the police shot at the demonstrators, possibly using rubber bullets, and used teargas and armoured vehicles to clear the blockade. Such a level of force would appear to be excessive and involve a serious misjudgement by those in charge. Although we have no information about this, we are concerned that the British-supplied water cannon vehicles currently deployed in West Papua may have been used and therefore contributed to the escalation of the violence. We would ask you to investigate.

The understandable anger and long-held grievances of the Papuans cannot be addressed by the use of force involving firearms, tear gas and water cannon and we would once again repeat our call for the water cannon vehicles to be withdrawn from West Papua.

Papuan anger about Freeport has been mounting for some time. It has almost certainly been increased by Indonesia's provocative insistence on creating a new province of West Irian Jaya in contravention of the law on special autonomy and despite widespread opposition to the new arrangement. Last month, people living in the vicinity of the Freeport mine were prevented from prospecting for remnants of gold left in the tailings deposited by the mine. This highlighted the gross discrepancies between the huge profits enjoyed by the company and the inability of local inhabitants to gain some profit from a natural resource that they regard as being rightfully theirs.

We would ask you to support calls for an independent investigation into yesterday's events and encourage the Indonesian government to enter into urgent dialogue with representatives of the demonstrators and those affected by the Freeport operations so that the situation can be resolved as soon as possible by peaceful means.

We are grateful to you for your attention to this matter and we await your response.

Yours sincerely, Paul Barber

Cc: Margaret Tongue, Head of Indonesia and Timor-Leste team, FCO

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