Papua Merdeka - Free West Papua

The jailing five Australians “for illegally entering Indonesia's Papua province” shines an unwanted spotlight on this forgotten corner of the world.

The group were accused of entering Indonesia illegally, after they travelled to Papua on a small plane from Horn Island, off the tip of Queensland's Cape York on September 12. The Australians have described it as a sightseeing flight and mistakenly believed they could get visas on arrival in Papua. SMH

Granted independence by the Dutch an elected Papuan council took office on 5 April 1961. The Council decided on the name of West Papua, a national emblem, a flag called the Morning Star or Bintang Kejora.

However, Indonesia threatened with an invasion, and with the help of the Soviet Union, the compliance of Australia, the US and the Netherlands, took control of the territory in May 1963. So much for the will of the people and the defence of their sovereignty.

Indonesians live in fear of West Papua freedom building the same sort of Australian and international support as their former colony of Timor Leste (East Timor). It seems the Australia government share that concern. I think it is time we made those concerns real by showing support and spreading the story.

The Free Papua Movement (Indonesian: Organisasi Papua Merdeka, abbreviated OPM) is a separatist organization established in 1965 which seeks independence for Western New Guinea from Indonesia. Some links for further details:

For a Free and Independent West Papua

Free West Papua Organisations and Offices

Unbelievable diversity

The people of New Guinea, Melanesians, are racially and culturally separated from the Indonesian archipelago by some 40,000 years. A racial classification is thought to be inaccurate because it ignores the broad cultural, linguistic, social and genetic diversity in the area. Some argue that there is no one "Melanesian culture" or way of life.

New Guinea is perhaps the most linguistically diverse region in the world. Besides the Austronesian languages, there are some 800 languages divided into perhaps sixty small language families, with unclear relationships to each other or to anything else, plus a large number of language isolates.

That is just the people, with about 786,000 km² of tropical land, less than one-half of one percent (0.5%) of the earth's surface, New Guinea has an immense ecological value in terms of biodiversity, with between 5 to 10% of the total species on the planet.

There are probably well over 200,000 species of insect, between 11,000 to 20,000 plant species; over 650 resident bird species, over 400 amphibians; 455 butterfly species, 284 species and six orders of mammals. The island's frogs are one of the most poorly known vertebrate groups, currently totalling 282 species, but this number is expected to double or even triple when all species have been documented.

Then of course there is gold, copper ore, crude oil, natural gas, timber, fish, oil palm, tea, rubber, logs; all of those choice goodies which ensure we wealthy nations will continue to support the subjugation of the Melanesians on economic grounds.

Time to rattle the cage

Given the outcome Timor Leste (East Timor) who achieved a bloody independence in 2000, the Indonesian have every reason to fear a gathering of support for Papua Merdeka. On the other hand Papuans have every right to stand alone, and not be subject to the brutal rule of Indonesia.

Journalists are banned from entering West Papua and tourists severely discouraged; a tight lid is kept in a largely successful attempt to prevent the true story of the province leaking out. This control is apparently supported by Australian and neighbouring PNG governments. The stories that do emerge are from radical sources and quickly buries.

The potential this time is to highlight the fate of five naive travelers who assumed it was fine to stop in Wet Papua on a small aircraft jaunt. That news story was quickly buried, but is potentially the catalyst for wider awareness of Indonesia’s atrocities in the province.

I do ask each of you to take a bit of time to look further into this situation, then act in the way you see most effective. To me simply spreading the word, telling and increasing circle of people, is a good start.