Some personal remarks with regard to threats to the Papuan indigenous population of West Papua since 1962 Indoensia.

1. Papuans at Risk. Some Personal Observations
At Ipenburg1
(27-1-2003)
Introduction
On 15 August 1962 the governments of the Netherlands, the USA and Indonesia agreed
to hand over Dutch New Guinea to Indonesia, after a short interregnum of the United
Nations. This was decided in New York without any consultation of the Papuans. On 1
October 1962 the Indonesian Army entered New Guinea. Almost immediately the army
began to secure Indonesian occupation by intimidating, arresting and killing, extra
judicially, opponents or perceived opponents of Indonesian rule. The army had already
since the late 1940s experience with putting down rebellions in West-Java, Sumatra, the
Minahasa (Pemesta Rising), South Sulawesi (Islamic Republic of Makassar) and in the
Moluccas (Republik Maluku Selatan). Some of these movements had considerable local
support and legitimacy. The USA gave at times some support to these movements as
part of its anti-communist crusade. West Papua is different. West Papua had, unlike the
other areas, apart from East Timor, an internationally recognized status as an area
separate from the Indonesian Republic from 1950 till 1962. The role and position of the
army is also different in West Papua, compared to other provinces, again apart from East
Timor. The army has kept the special position it had at the beginning of the occupation in
1962. Army officers serve as governors, regents and heads of district. In this civilian
capacity they remain under army discipline. The official double function (dwifungsi), the
military and the political role,wais part of the New Order system of government and this
legitimates the supremacy of the army. The army still is the real power in West Papua. It
has extensive business interests. West Papua is also important for the army to get war
experience, essential for fast promotions. The police did not have an independent role,
but operated as a wing of the army in the New Order.
It is very difficult to get reliable information about what is really going on in West Papua
as there are still restrictions on journalists and researchers doing research on “sensitive”
topics like human rights. Foreign journalists would rarely get the special permit needed to
enter West Papua. All foreigners still need a special police permit (Asurat jalan@ ) to visit
places outside the cities. They have then to report to police and army posts. Some areas
like Paniai and the Star Mountains were completely out of bounds for foreigners.
Expatriates working in West Papua are dependent on work permits which are only issued
after screening by the military intelligence. In the Soeharto era the mass media were
controlled and there is no tradition of investigative journalism. Large national papers, like
Kompas and Suara Pembaruan only report on West Papua when there are serious
incidents. The area, generally speaking, is underreported in the general press and also
by the official press agency Antara of which foreign press and foreign news agencies are
largely dependent.
Only after Soeharto handed over his presidency to Habibie, with the introduction of
“reformation” (reformasi) violations of human rights could be discussed I n the open..This
also enabled the establishment in West Papua of two quite effective organisations
monitoring human rights violations: Elsham Papua and the Justice and Peace Secretariat
of the Jayapura Diocese2
have been established.
1
At Ipenburg taught anthropology and sociology at the Theological College Izaak Samuel Kijne in Jayapura, West Papua from
1995 till 2002. He is at present engaged in the writing of a history of the Church in West-Papua from an anthropological
perspective.
2
E.g. the reports by the Justice and Peace Secretariat and Elsham Papua.
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2. Five cases
We lived in West Papua from the end of 1995 till April 2002. The political tension was a
striking phenomenon all the time we lived there. Several of our Papuan friends and
colleagues felt threatened. There was until 1998 only one daily, the Cenderawasih Pos,
with biased information. In May 1998 there came more openness and there was less fear
for police informers. We witnessed a high mortality among Papuans. Causes were
among others: medical neglect, political violence, (methyl) alcohol, crime, domestic
violence and traffic accidents. If the death was because of violence by the police or the
army in no case perpetrators were brought to court and sentenced... Often it was the
other way around and the police started to interrogate and detain people, charged with
defamation, who criticized publicly the violence used by members of the security
apparatus. I discuss here five cases.
(a) On 4 July 1998 a student of Uncen, Steven Suripatty, was killed by army personnel
during a Afree speech@ demonstration (mimbar bebas) on the campus of the university.
The army refused to start an investigation. Also an innocent bystander, the daughter of a
lecturer of our Theological College, was wounded in her knee by a gun shot. The army
refused to give any compensation for the costs of the operations she needed to have in
Jakarta. The army shopt the student in revenge for the manhandling by students of a
police informer who had entered the campus with a loaded revolver, claiming that he was
a student. The army refused to investigate the case and bring the perpetrators to book
as long as the students refused to hand over those involved in the manhandling of the
police informer.
(b) A lecturer of the Theological College Fajar Timur, Obeth Badii, a Me from Paniai, was
killed in suspicious circumstances, also in 1998. He was well educated and had studied
in the USA, where he had received a Masters degree. There was no autopsy done and
no police investigation initiated to find the perpetrators, notwithstanding the public outcry
because of his death. His students of the Roman Catholic Theological College Fajar
Timur launched a demonstration to demand justice. It is possible that the attack was
targeted at the Kompas journalist Octavianus Mote, whose house was next to Obeth= s
house in Waena. Obeth had already warned Octo that unknown persons had been seen
moving in the neighbourhood of his house. Octovianus, like Obeth, is from Paniai and
there is a similarity in appearance.
They said that there were three witnesses. One was killed in a road accident; the second
one was hit by a car that was driving at full speed without lamps and without a number
plate. The car stopped and loaded the victim in the boot of the car. The third one went
into hiding.
(c) On 7 December 2000 police raided in the middle of the night all the dormitories of the
high school and college students from the interior. These students are considered more
radical than the students from the coast. There may also have been the intention to
create a division in the front against Indonesia. The reason for the police action was the
murder of a Papua policeman in Abepura and a watchman at the building of the
provincial government for local autonomy. This was generally seen as a reason created
by the security apparatus. About 100 students were rounded up, many of them still
minors. Most of them were released the next day. The girls who were arrested expressed
gratitude that they had not been raped by the police! The director of a mission hospital
where many of the victims of the police action were treated expressed his horror at the
type of wounds the students had. Large open wounds meant to hurt. People were loaded
on a lorry with complete disregard of their health and well-being. There were lots of
broken shoulders and limbs. The director had made medical reports of the wounds of the
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3. victims though the police had forbidden the hospital to do this. Part of this police action
was witnessed by Oswald Iten, a journalist of the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, who was
detained at the police office of the Jayapura Regency (Polres) in Jayapura charged with
a violation of the Immigration Law. He watched, in horror, from his crowded prison cell
how two students, Joni Karunggu and Orry Doronggi, were being beaten to death by a
group of police.
(d) In February 2002 in broad daylight two police officers shot and killed a 33 year old
Papuan minister, Rev. Robert Ongge, in the house of his Chinese in-law in Abepura near
the market. The minister was supposed to have demanded money from his in-law and
the in-law had asked help from the police for his protection, according to the papers. It
was not clear why the police had to resort to shooting the minister. The Cenderawasih
Pos had a picture of the dead body of the minister on the front page, in full colour. The
(Papuan) public protest against this killing was immediately and extensive. The market
was closed. The people of his home village, Kampung Harapan barricaded the road from
Jayapura to Sentani. This is the only road to the airport from Jayapura. The protest took
a whole day and was ended by the Mobile Brigade. The case was never cleared. The
commander of police admitted that the two police officers had acted rashly, due to their
young age and lack of experience. No action was taken against them. The
Cenderawasih Pos tried to investigate the matter by interviewing the parents and friends
of the victim, but nothing new came out of it. The victim was not known to be politically
active. He had just returned to his home village with his Chinese wife and two young
children after a long stay as a minister in Jakarta. He had just started a church choir in
Kampung Harapan.
(e) A young man, Johan, who had just graduated from Uncen, was killed in Jayapura,
when in the evening together with his fiancée; he was preparing a church building for a
celebration. He was killed by four men with an army dagger in front of the eyes of his
fiancée. The dagger got stuck in the body and could be retrieved as evidence. This type
of dagger is exclusively in use by soldiers. It seemed that the perpetrators thought that
he was of the police. The soldiers wanted to take revenge as just before a soldier had
been killed by police at a quarrel at Jayapura harbour when the passenger vessel from
Jakarta had docked there. The commander of the police asked the commander of the
army if any dagger was missing. The army commander declared after asking his officers
that no army dagger was missing. There the investigation ended. Students of Uncen
were angry with the unwillingness of the police to investigate the murder and to bring the
perpetrators to court. They staged a demonstration blocking the road between Jayapura
and Waena. The Mobile Brigade of the police opened the road by force.
In none of these cases the victims were known as political activists. Police always tried to
cover up the case and to protect the perpetrators. The human rights organisation of the
government, KPP HAM, investigated the Abepura case. The police spokesman reacted
by stating that this organisation was biased and provocative.. The police threatened
Elsham, which also made a report on the case, with legal action.
There are quite a few cases where there were fatal casualties in confrontations between
demonstrators and the police or the army. This took place in July 1998 in Biak and in
2000 in Nabire, Sorong, Timika and Manokwari. A very serious incident took place in
October 2000 in Wamena, with 122 victims. The bloody incidents in 2000 had all to do
with the unwillingness of Papuan to lower their Morning star flag, which has religious and
cultural significance. Though allowed by President Wahid in December 1999 the army
and police continued to see the raising of the flag, in defiance with the decision of the
Head of State as separatism, which is high treason which carries the death penalty. In
3

4. the new Special Autonomy Law for the Province, effective from January 2002, the
province is allowed to have its own flag. The army in West Papua reacted immediately
that it would not allow any other flag next to the Red-White Flag (Merah-Putih) of the
Indonesian Republic in defiance to the new law!
There is also a number of Papuans murdered by civilians. In the period we lived in
Sentani we found that almost every year a Papuan was killed in the market (pasar) of
Sentani often by Buginese to defend their monopoly in trading. We did not hear about
perpetrators being brought to court and sentenced. However, when three Papuans, in
revenge, killed a Buginese motor taxi driver at Jalan Pos Tujuh in Sentani all three were
very soon arrested and sentenced to imprisonment. In August 2000 Papuans burned the
bazaar of Sentani because the Buginese community failed to hand over a Buginese
accused of killing a Papuan in a drunken brawl in a brothel. Police again failed to
apprehend the perpetrator.
The Context
There is a climate conducive for serious human rights violations. Such violations seem to
the population at large as unavoidable as natural disasters. Perpetrators enjoy impunity.
The judicial system is inefficient and corruption is rife. There is hardly a free press with a
tradition of investigative journalism which could take up the issue. Only in the last few
years some weeklies have emerged aiming at more critical reporting, like Jubi and Tifa
Papua. Most NGOs are weak and under control of the government or the army. The
situation could be worse than in East Timor or Aceh as potential victims are more easily
identifiable because of their Melanesian appearance (curly hair, dark skin). Racialism
adds to the problem. Javanese Muslims look down on Christian Papuans, with curly hair,
who eat pork and drink alcohol. Papuans are seen as naked, primitive, drunkards, hardly
human compared to the Javanese who are heirs of the great Majapahit Empire.
Education at every level is of a low quality, dedicated to learning by heart and
submission to authority and the absence of fluency of English which would enable
Papuans to communicate human rights violations to the outside world. There are no
foreign correspondents in the province, except for one from the Sydney Morning Herald.
For news the foreign press is dependent on local correspondents or on the official news
agencies, like Antara, which echoes the views of the police and the army.
Z. Sawor was one of the leading Papuans, who had a Dutch education and a
considerable responsibility at the advent of Indonesian rule. He describes in a small
booklet in Dutch the process of Indonesianisation. Many people of the stature of Sawor,
including Sawor himself became victim of the suspicions of the Indonesians. The
Indonesian army behaved more as an army of occupation than as an army that had
liberated the Papuans from an oppressive colonial power. The army claimed the land, its
people and their belongings by right of conquest. It tried to wipe out completely any
traces of Dutch presence in government and education. All schools and individuals had
to destroy their textbooks in Dutch. From one day to the other teaching and examinations
had to change from Dutch to Malay (Bahasa Indonesia). Teachers and civil servants had
to do military type exercises on Saturday morning at the office of the Governor. All
textbooks of the Dutch period were replaced by those used in the rest of Indonesia,
though the contents were less appropriate to the culture and natural environment of New
Guinea. Educated Papuans in church, education, trade and the civil service, who were
fluent in Dutch, were suspected of being pro-Dutch and, by implication, anti-Indonesian.
These were Aenemies.@
Zawor (1969: 34) describes how there was already as early as December 1962 a nightly
attack on the dormitories of the Teacher Training College, the Civil Servants school
4

5. (ABestuursschool@ ), the Agricultural College and the Christian schools in Kota Raja in
Jayapura by Indonesian soldiers, using pro-Indonesian groups. Students were beaten up
and then transported to the military camp at Ifar Gunung, where they were imprisoned. A
considerable group of leading Papuans ended up in prison or were killed in this early
period. Among them were Eliezer Jan Bonay, the first governor, Rev. G. A. Lanta, the
former vice-chairman of the Synod of the GKI, Rev. Silas Chaay, secretary of the GKI,
Rev. Osok of the Moi tribe of the Bird’s Head, Saul Hindom, who had studied in Utrecht
and was the leader of Shell in Biak, Hank Yoka, the former secretary of the New Guinea
Council, Alfeus Yoku, a leader from Sentani and David Hanasbey, inspector of police in
Jayapura. Johan Ariks, former chairman of the Papua delegation at the Round Table
Conference in 1949, where he pleaded for independence for the Papuans, separate
from Indonesia, died, at the age of 70, in Manokwari prison, after a speech he held on 1
July 1965, which was considered to be anti-Indonesian. Permenas Yoku, a teacher in
Sentani, was killed at the end of 1963, because he refused to sign a pro-Indonesian
declaration3
Even the pro-Indonesian Frits Kirihio from Serui, who had joined Soebandrio
to New York, ended up in prison in the late 1960s. It was, according to Zawor, a policy of
the intelligence department to eliminate in a secret way anybody suspected of having
links with people who wanted to overthrow the Indonesian Government.4
It seems that this policy has set a pattern, not only in West Papua, but also in other
areas where the army got a free hand, like in North Kalimantan, East Timor and Aceh.
Public statements of police and army up to the highest level are symptomatic for the
attitude of the security apparatus towards the Papuans. In October 2000 in Wamena the
police acted with excessive violence to bring down the Morning Star flag, symbol of the
aspirations of the Papuans. When the Papuans retaliated with violence the national
Head of Police (Kapolri) declared that Papuans are animals who kill, burn and rape
women and children. In November of that year the provincial head of police at a meeting
with NGOs declared publicly that Papuans are criminals.
Strategies of the army and police
There seems to be a strategy of the security apparatus (army, police, special troops,
intelligence) behind the serious human rights violations, including extra judicial killings. A
major purpose is to create a climate of fear to intimidate people and to prevent any form
of opposition to Indonesian rule. So extra judicial killings of Papuan leaders could also be
seen as a preventive, not only a punitive action. The army also tries to provoke conflicts.
This enables it to come into action and to get a legitimisation of the use of violence in
order to restore Alaw and order.@
3
Z. Sawor, 1969: 40-45, quoting a Report by Silas Papare, member of
the People=s Congress, Jakarta, 13 March 1967. Zacharias Sawor studied tropical agriculture in Deventer, the Netherlands, till 1962. He was treasurer of
Parkindo, West Irian Section, from 1963 till 1965. He was in prison from August 1965 till August 1966. In June 1967 he fled to Australian New Guinea. Since October
1968 he lives in the Netherlands. The book of Sawor, though written in Dutch, was forbidden by the Indonesian government.
4
Z. Sawor, 1969: 49, quoting a Report of the Command of the Regional
Police XXL, West Irian, First Quarter 1966, by Drs. Soejoko, Chief of
Staff Secret Intelligence Service, Soekarnopoera, 26 June 1966. The
quotation is: AY ditembak mati dengan tjara yang tidak kentara oleh anggota2 dari daerah Indonesia sendiri. Hingga hal ini tidak dapat
dimengertikan oleh pihak penduduk daerah Irian Barat sendiri.@ The way Obeth Badii in 1999 and Theys Eluay in 2001 were killed seem to be
follow this policy See also Soemadi, 1974 (2nd
ed) for a similar policy of preventive
elimination of key leaders by anti-guerrilla units (Soejadi, 1974 (2nd
ed), Peranan Kalimanatan
Barat dalam menghadapi subversi komunis Asia Tenggara. Suatu tinjaman internasional terhadap geakan komunis dari sudut pertahanan wilayah khususnya Kalimantan
Barat, Yayasan Tanjungpura.
5

6. (a) Provoking conflicts
This is what Papuans call the playing of Agames@ (pemain) by army or police. With this
they mean that a particular killing has another purpose than just the elimination of a
particular person. Such a killing is meant to provoke a particular group to revenge. This
would then provide a justification for retaliation by the security apparatus. The strategy of
trying to provoke violence is seen at the way the army and police go about to stop
peaceful flag raising ceremonies. Though these were allowed by the president, Gus Dur,
in December 1999 the army still considered it high treason, which would call for summary
extra judicial execution. In Wamena in October 2000 the army immediately began to
shoot at Papuans gathered around the flag in prayer, though they had already accepted
that their Morning Star flag should be lowered. The flag was torn, trampled upon and
peed upon. The hospital in Wamena was forbidden to treat Papuan patients with gun
shot wounds. In this context it is also strange that no autopsy was conducted on the
dead bodies of the victims. They were all dumped into a mass grave, and buried after a
short funeral service by Muslim and Christian religious leaders.
(b) Creating divisions
The intelligence of the army tried to turn the vertical conflict of the Papuans with the
Indonesian central government into a horizontal conflict of migrants (Apendatang@ ) and
original inhabitants (Aorang asli@ ). The silent majority had to get activated. This means
migrants had to get into conflict with Papuans after provocations by the army.
The violent attack on the boarding houses of the students from the interior in December
2000 can be seen as a strategy to divide the more radical students from the Baliem
Valley and Paniai from the more moderate activists at the coast. There were several fatal
casualties. One incident was witnessed, in horror, by the Swiss top journalist Oswald Iten
in the prison of the regional police (Polres) in Jayapura. At the incident over 100 students
were arrested and ill-treated. Religious differences are also used to create divisions and
horizontal conflicts. At a particular tense period a lecturer at the Theological College I. S.
Kijne got an anonymous phone call that a church had been burnt down by Muslims. The
idea is to provoke retaliation and to set hatred between the religions as happened in
Ambon and North Moluccas.
A first year student of the Theological College I. S. Kijne, a pretty 21 year old girl of
Moluccan origin, was in broad daylight hacked to death by a student from the
neighbouring state university Cenderawasih University or UNCEN. The perpetrator was a
Dani from the Baliem Valley. In shock and mourning the whole school of 700 students
suspended all activities and went into mourning for a whole week. The body of the girl
was laid in state in the assembly hall of the school. While the mourning was going on
unknown people entered the campus area and shouted AAllah Ho Akbar@ , Allah is
great. A lady started shouting insults at one particular lecturer. At the final funeral service
the provincial head of police intimated the students not to take revenge on a particular
population group (he meant the Dani) though there was nobody who had that in mind.
We did not hear that the murderer was charged. The police said that he was a mental
case. The perpetrator was, as far as we know, never brought to court, notwithstanding
action by the Legal Aid Department of the Synod of the GKI.
There was in November 2001 a news item in the paper Cenderawasih Pos shortly before
the killing of Theys Eluay, that a grandmother, who could speak only Buginese, had been
raped by a drunken youth at five o’clock in the morning in the main square of Jayapura.
This was front page news for several days. It was clear that only a Papuan youth could
be drunk at that time of the night. The Buginese dominate the markets and are known for
their aggressiveness. There was a press conference at the police headquarters where
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7. the regional police commander mentioned that the underwear of the lady was material
evidence! This story was probably too absurd to be effective.
The murder of Theys Eluay, leader of the Council of the Papua Presidium (PDP), the
Papuan elected body to advance the political aspirations of the Papuans, is another
point in case. Initially, without, however, giving any evidence, the national Head of Police
(Kapolri) said that Theys was murdered by fellow Papuans because Theys had not
rejected the government offer of regional autonomy. Later the Head of the Kopassus in
Jayapura confessed that one of his men was in the car with Theys Eluay questioning him
on his position on autonomy and independence. He might have died because of a heart
attack in the process. In the end after a lot of pressure also by international
organisations, the commander of Kopassus in Jayapura and a few of his men were
brought to a military court. They got fairly lenient sentences, and were released pending
appeal. The commander-in-chief of the Indonesian army protested against the
sentences: these men were not murderers, but “heroes” defending the national unity of
Indonesian Republic.
(c) Elimination of actual and potential leaders
Quite a few leaders or potential leaders have been eliminated. We mentioned already
Johan Ariks, the religious leader, Arnold Ap, the musician and director of the
Anthropology Museum at Uncen, the University of the Paradise Bird, Eduard Mofu,
musician, Thomas Wanggai, the economist who studied in Japan and the US, and who
died in detention, Obeth Badii, who studied in the US, Rev. Robert Ongge from
Kampung Harapan, who had studied in Java and who had served for years in a
congregation in Jakarta, and Sam Kapisa, the artist, who died in a hotel room in Jakarta,
shortly after coming back from a family visit in Holland. When I asked villagers in
Kampung Harapan why their minister, Robert Ongge, was killed they replied that the
Indonesians do not like Papuans who rise to a higher level.
In August 1999 the wife of a quite outstanding and well educated Papuan, a minister and
lecturer at a theological college, who had studied abroad, died in the Naval Hospital in
Hamadi. She was 42 years old and had fainted after a fall at home. She died shortly after
been given an infuse though she looked quite healthy before. Immediately after being
given the infuse just after the husband had left the hospital to bring the children home
the lady’s face changed colour. When the husband on his return to the hospital wanted
to know the cause of the sudden and unexpected death of his wife from the neurologist
in charge of the treatment the man just walked away without giving any information.
Our school lost in the middle of 2001 a very bright student, a girl of 21, who died half an
hour after entering the hospital in Abepura with a complaint that she had taken too many
chloroquin tablets, when suffering from malaria. She was drowsy, but not in coma as she
reacted to questions by her aunt, who accompanied her to the hospital. She was given
an infuse, and died soon after that. The medical staff refused to discuss with the aunt the
cause of death.
(d) Militias
Militias have served their purpose in East Timor. These groups are less well trained and
also cheaper than the regular army. Though they are under the control of the army they
can do things the army can not do, as to the outside the fiction is kept that these groups
are an initiative of local people. In West Papua these militias were called Satgas Papua.
Satgas is short for Satuan Tugas or ATaskforce@ . They were nominally under the
command of Theys Eluay, who also served as their paymaster. Theys= bill was,
however, paid by the leader of the Pemuda Pancasila, Yorrys Raweyai, who serves the
7

8. interests of the Soeharto family. The idea of the Satgas Papua became so popular that it
was taken up by many Papuans all over the province. Satgas outside the Jayapura-
Sentani area did not accept control by Theys Eluay. Generally speaking, apart from
some incidents, there was more discipline than one would expect from such an
improvised force. By the end of 2000 the army had the Satgas disbanded and declared
illegal. In 2001 we heard in Jayapura area of the infiltration by army personal posing as
minibus drivers and as motor cycle taxi drivers (Ajoke@ ). Since the beginning of 2002
the Lascar Jihad, with a record of anti Christian violence in Ambon, the North Moluccas,
middle Sulawasi, were reportedly infiltrating into West Papua.
(e) Particular campaigns
There are also specific campaigns to intimidate the population. In the 1960s there was
Operasi Sadar (Awareness Campaign) (Brigadier General. Kartijo), Operasi Bhratayudha
(Brigadier General. R. R. Bintaro) and Operasi Wibawa (Authority Campaign) (Brigadier
General. Sarwo Edhie). In the 1970s Governor Acup Zainal introduced already “Operasi
Koteka” (penis sheath, the traditional dress of Papuan men in the interior) which caused
tens of thousands of victims in the Highlands. In 1977 General Imam Munander initiated
Operasi Kikis (Scraping Campaign) in the Baliem Valley. In the Mamberamo area and the
area of the North Coast of Jayapura Regency there was “Operasi Tumpas” and “Operasi
Sadar” (Annihilation Campaign and Awareness Campaign) in the 1980s. West Biak
suffered under Operasi Sapu Rata (A Clean Sweep Campaign), when the security forces
tried to arrest Melkianus Awom, an OPM leader. In November 2000 the police began an
“Operasi Tuntas Matoa”. (Total Matoa Campaign) Matoa stands for the sweet fruit one
finds in West Papua, which is a symbol for the province. In June 2001 police began a
ASweeping and Clampdown Operation@ in Manokwari, Fak-Fak and Nabire, areas
where foreign companies are active. There were several casualties. The local human
rights organisation criticized police conduct and as a consequence got death threats by
anonymous telephone callers. In August 2002 police started a campaign called AOperasi
Adil Matoa@ , the AJust Matoa Campaign@ . The police commander I Made Pastika
announced that he was using first the Apersuasive approach@ and then the Acoercive
approach.@
Papuan mortality
We lived in Yoka Pantai, a Papua village on the shore of Lake Sentani, close by Waena
and Abepura. The village has 1,152 inhabitants, with 300 families (2001 figures). As we
lived next to the church and the church bells are being rung at each death in the village it
was not difficult to get an estimate of the number of deaths in a given period. I counted in
a period of 3 months 8 deaths. This amounts to 32 deaths a year. Villagers told me that
this was a reasonable estimate for annual mortality, though there were years it could be
as high as sixty. 32 Deaths a year gives a mortality rate of over 28 per 1,000. A few
typical cases in Yoka Pantai were as follows. A girl of four was playing on the street and
was overrun by a motor cycle that was speeding. She died. The case was reported to the
police together with information about the perpetrator, who lives in a neighbouring
transmigration area. Though there were witnesses police rejected to take up the case
because of Alack of evidence.@ The people in Yoka believe that the perpetrator is from
the Kopassus and the police are afraid to take up the case.
A neighbour, who has a drinking problem, beat his wife to death. The people in the
village waited for the relatives of the wife from Sorong to claim damages. The case was
not reported to the police. In the end nothing came from the claims of damages and the
crime went unpunished. People feel that there is no purpose in reporting such crimes to
the police, who purportedly only complicates the matter and start charging bribes from
the family of the victim as well as of the perpetrator.
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9. A boy, 21 years old, a grandson of a well-known minister Rev. Okoka was beaten at the
police office of Abepura for being drunk in public. He was then dropped by a police car at
his parental home. The following morning his mother found him dead in his bed. People
in the village considered this “normal.” Such cases are usually also not taken up by
Elsham or Justice and Peace.
Our school, the Theological College Izaak Samuel Kijne, has about 700 students in the
age group 20 to 30. Half of them are women. The students are mainly in the age group
25 to 30. In 2001 15 students died. This gives death rate of 21 out of 1,000 in a usually
healthy age group. Causes of death were: traffic accidents, violence in the family, police
violence, murder, suicide and diseases such as TB, malaria, and stroke. Medical services
are inadequate. Mortality in hospitals is so high that some Papuans sincerely believe that
there are Kopassus officers in a white doctor= s coat who give injections or infuses to
finish off Papuans. If suspicious relatives want information from the doctor about the
cause of death it is often refused, just as an autopsy.
Conclusion
There are not many reliable reports about human rights violations in West Papua. In
1992 the Evangelical Church composed the “Blue Book” (after the colour of the cover). It
summarizes a considerable number of human rights violations in Biak and around Sarmi,
Ormu and other places at the coast of Jayapura Regency. based on reports of ministers
and church elders. The report was submitted to the PGI, the Indonesian Council of
Churches in preparation for its presentation at the General Assembly of the PGI to be
held in Jayapura in 1995. The Chairman of the PGI, Naboban, did not want to take up
the issue, considering it probably too dangerous. The Indonesian Government reacted
strongly against this report, and this type of reporting was not repeated until the
courageous report about human rights violations by the army in Timika by the Bishop of
Jayapura, Herman Munninghoff in 1995. He managed to have his report endorsed by the
National Human Rights Commission (Komnasham) instituted by Soeharto. There is,
notwithstanding the excellent work of Elsham Papua and the Justice and Peace
Secretariat, a considerable under reporting of serious human rights violations in WP.
This is caused by the fact that Papuans are already so used to this that they accept it as
one accepts natural disasters. Many Papuans in the interior do not even speak
Indonesian. There is not really yet an idea of a concept like human and civil rights.
Neither do Papuans outside the cities, generally speaking, have an idea that human
rights violations could be reported. This is just now changing. Moreover reporting human
rights violations implicating police or army is a very risky business as witnesses are
threatened or even eliminated. Even church authorities and employees of Elsham have
this experience. The new freedom for NGOs with the fall of Soeharto in 1998 is well used
by Elsham Papua, the Justice and Peace Secretariat of the Jayapura Diocese and the
Legal and Human Rights Department of the Evangelical Christian Church for to publicize
human rights violations and also to give training courses to village people in human
rights.
West Papua is still not completely open for journalists. Journalists, at times, are
intimidated and threatened, being accused of “misuse of their entry visa”. This offence,
as is said, carries a fairly long prison sentence. Oswald Iten from the Neue Zürcher
Zeitung was a witness of the arrest and torture to death of two young Papua students at
the police office of Jayapura Regency (Polres) in December 2000. Iten was imprisoned
and threatened because he was a journalist. Apart from a correspondent of the Sydney
Morning Herald there are no foreign correspondents in WP. Much of the reporting is
done by Antara, the government controlled press agency. The local journalists are not
well trained and do not have a tradition of investigative journalism. It is rumoured that the
9

10. main local paper, the Cenderawasih Pos, part of the Jawa Pos Company, is controlled by
the army. This would explain why much of the news is about appointments and other
events in the army. Almost daily the picture of a general of the army or the police
decorates the front page. There is only one province wide radio station and one TV
station. These are government controlled. Moreover there is a climate of fear which
prevents reporting of human rights. Only Elsham Papua and the Catholic Justice and
Peace Secretariat do this on a regular and systematic basis. Both organisations are
understaffed and can not be complete in their reporting.
NGOs and churches are prosecuted for defamation (fitnah), a crime under Indonesian
law if they dare to criticize the security apparatus or when they protest against particular
human rights violations.
The mentality of police and army and their attitude towards the Papuans as occasionally
expressed in public statements is conducive for massive human rights violations.
Papuans are animals, criminals, or pigs who copulate with pigs. These are the insults
police and army hurls at Papuans, who are arrested. Also the apparent impunity of the
perpetrators does not help to publicize complaints. The case of the killings of several
students and the torture of about 100 of them in December 2000 in Abepura has been
taken up by the National Commission of Human Rights (Komnasham) as it falls within
the bounds of the new law to prevent human rights violations. Up to now this has,
however, not led to a prosecution of the perpetrators.
When one analyses closely the context in which human rights violations take place then
one has to conclude that it is possible that very serious human rights violations are taking
place in an organized and systematic way. There hardly seem to be any restraints on
individual or collective misconduct of members of the security apparatus in West Papua
with regard to the Papuans. Perpetrators who are member of the security apparatus
enjoy impunity. The situation calls for a thorough international investigation under the
auspices of the United Nations as the UN still has some responsibility since the UNTEA
period (October 1962-May 1963) and the UN supervised Act of Free Choice (14 July - 2
August 1969).
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Keadilan dan Perdamaian (Suatu Pertanggung Jawaban Sejarah). Laporan Disampaikan
Kepada MPH-PGI dari GKI di Irian Jaya, April 1992
Sawor, Zacharias, 1969. Ik ben een Papua, Een getuigeverslag van de toestanden in
Westelijk Nieuw Guinea sinds de gezagsoverdracht op 1 October 1962, Groningen: De
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Van den Broek OFM, Theo and J. Budi Hemawan OFM, 2001. Memoria Passionis di
Papua. Kondisi Hak Asasi Manusia Gambaran 1999, Jakarta: LSPP/SKP;
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