Military Aggression

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The Author

U.S. Training of Kopassus: A Bad Idea Whose Time Has Not Come

The East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) warned President Barack Obama against renewing any U.S. training for Indonesia's notorious special forces.

"Training Kopassus will set back efforts to achieve accountability for past and recent human rights violations and will do little or nothing to discourage future crimes," said John M. Miller, National Coordinator of ETAN. "This is a bad idea whose time has not come."

The Obama administration is considering resuming training of Kopassus and may announce a change in policy when President Obama visits Indonesia later this month.

"It's impossible to credit Kopassus with human rights reform when it retains active duty soldiers convicted of human rights violations," said Miller. These include soldiers convicted of killing West Papuan leader Theys Eluay and the kidnapping and disappearances of Indonesian activists in 1997 and 1998.

Impunity at the Freeport Gold & Copper Mine: Will Indonesian Security Forces Get Away with It Again?

West Papua Advocacy Team Statement
Source: WPAT

Contact: Edmund McWilliams, West Papua Advocacy Team, +1.575.648.2078 (English)
Eben Kirksey, Ph.D., University of California, +1.831.600.5937 (English or Bahasa Indonesia)

July 23, 2009 - Amidst an ongoing shooting spree at the Freeport McMoRan mining concession in Timika, West Papua, four people have died, including an Australian Freeport employee. Six separate ambushes have taken place since shootings began on July 11.

A race to find scapegoats appears underway. Indonesian authorities have arrested as many as 20 individuals. Trusted sources informed the West Papua Advocacy Team that these detainees have been interrogated without the presence of their lawyers and at least one, an elderly man, was beaten by security personnel. Even after these recent detentions, a convoy of 12 Freeport busses again came under attack by gunmen on Wednesday, 22 July.

West Papuans recently announced a foundational consensus on their legal defence and right to declare national sovereignty, thereby asserting their fundamental human rights and ancestral ownership of land. (The consensus has global significance in that West Papua remains on a scale similar to the Amazon in terms of what is being lost - diversity of local species and tribal societies, and the amount of oxygen produced by the "lungs of Asia".)

A trying two months in Manokwari

The latest major earthquake to hit Indonesia's West Papua region highlights the plight faced by people who struggle to cope with the compounded effects of man-made and natural disasters.

John M. Miller | December 4, 2008
Editor: John Feffer

Foreign Policy In Focus (www.fpif.org)

According to some pundits, U.S. re-engagement with the largely unreformed and unrepentant Indonesian military is the best way to promote reform and human rights. The Wall Street Journal Asia, for instance, called on President-elect Barack Obama "to stand down liberal senators and interest groups" for seeking conditions on military assistance to Indonesia. "Indonesia's military has certainly had human rights problems in the past," the editorial states, but urges the incoming administration to forget about them in the name of building an alliance on the "global war on terror."

Preparations underway for visit of Indonesian President

Report from Manokwari, received 28 November 2008

Translation courtesy of Tapol

1. At the beginning of October, the Indonesian Army located 2 companies of LINUD 733 troops from Ambon in Manokwari. They have been placed in position as security guards at several posts around the town.

By CLIFFORD FAIPARIK

ABOUT 100 villagers in Western province are displaced and homeless after Indonesian soldiers raided their village and burnt houses, police in the province said yesterday. The raid was staged by a platoon-sized group of Indonesian soldiers, and police described it as an act of unprovoked aggression on PNG citizens living in Kwara village close to the PNG-Indonesian border last Tuesday.

SEE PHOTOS ATTACHED

Saturday 9 August 2008

Reports from Wamena this afternoon state that there has been a fatal shooting at an event to celebrate UN Indigenous Peoples Day. Reports say that rally event involves 20,000 local people.

The man who was shot is identified as Mr Opinus Tabuni, age 35. Mr Tabuni is said to have been shot in chest and killed after Indonesian security forces fired into the crowd at about 3.45 pm today.

URGENT MEDIA ALERT

WEST PAPUAN PEOPLE CONTINUE RALLIES OUTSIDE JAYAPURA PARLIAMENT TO KEEP PRESSURE FOR REFERENDUM

FOR IMMEDIATE BROADCAST
Thursday March 6 1530 AEST
JAYAPURA, WEST PAPUA, MARCH 6
Unswayed by threats, previous police brutality and their release from prison yesterday, Youth and Students of West Papua have joined today with detainees to keeping up the pressure on the Indonesian Government in demanding a Referendum for the future of West Papua. Eighty students braved BRIMOB to hold a peaceful rally on the steps of the Papuan People’s Assembly in Jayapura.