West Papua Advocacy Team January 21
Appeal To Secretary of State Clinton Regarding Human
Her Excellency
The Secretary of State
Ms. Hillary Rodham Clinton
Dear Secretary Clinton:
The West Papua Advocacy Team (WPAT) wishes to congratulate
you on your assumption of the office of Secretary of State.
Your record as a champion of human rights and the rule of
law gives hope to those who struggle for their human rights
against brutal repression. We strongly agree that those who
exercise brutal repression of their peoples are, in the
words of President Obama, "on the wrong side of history."
We trust that his unequivocal assertion of America's
commitment to human rights and your own leadership in
development and implementation of US foreign policy will
ensure a principled stand on behalf of those for whom
justice is still only a dream.
The struggle for human rights is especially arduous in the
Indonesian province of West Papua which has been under
Indonesian control since 1969 when a purported "act of
self-determination," widely regarded as fraudulent, secured
Indonesian control of this area. For over four decades
Indonesian security authorities, principally the Indonesian
military, have employed extreme brutality to repress Papuans
who have demanded political rights, and an end to
destructive exploitation of their vast natural resources.
Papuans have broadly rejected a six-year old Indonesian
promise of "special autonomy" as an unfulfilled pledge and
are urging an internationally mediated dialogue between the
Indonesian government to address long-standing Papuan
demands for fundamental political rights, demilitarization
of the province and a Papuan role in immigration,
development and other policies that fundamentally affect the
Papuan people.
Among those in especially urgent need of US foreign policy
founded on consistent promotion of human rights are Papuan
prisoners of conscience incarcerated for exercise of their
right to peaceful dissent. In the latter months of the
110th US Congressional session,
40 members of the US House of Representatives signed a
letter to Indonesian President Yudhoyono calling for
justice with regard to two Papuans, Filip Karma and Yusuf
Pakage, jailed for peaceful assertion of their right to
protest. Both are designated "prisoners of conscience" by
Amnesty International.
The West Papua Advocacy Team also wishes to call to your
attention the recent conviction by Indonesian courts of yet
eleven more Papuans who were found guilty of subversion and
sentenced on the 8 January 2009 to jail terms of three and
three-and-a-half years. These individuals were arrested in
March 2008 for involvement in peaceful, non-violent
demonstrations. They now join prisoners of conscience Karma
and Pakage and dozens of Papuans who similarly have been
jailed for non-violent protest which is protected by
Indonesian law and by international conventions to which
Indonesia is a party. It is important to note that the
Papuans who are incarcerated in the Indonesian penal system
in which a recent UN report noted torture and maltreatment
is widespread.
The Indonesian court's conviction of these Papuans stands in
stark contrast of the chronic failure of the Indonesian
judicial system to effectively prosecute senior Indonesian
military and intelligence officials for their roles in
violent acts against Papuans and other Indonesian and East
Timorese civilians, including the massacre of thousands of
East Timorese and the 2004 murder of the leading human
rights advocate and military critic Munir Said Thalib.
We urge that the new administration develop a plan to
encourage the democratizing Indonesian government to respect
human rights, and especially to end its repression of
peaceful dissent in West Papua and elsewhere in the
Indonesian archipelago. Papuan prisoners of conscience
should be released.
Finally, we also also urge you to demand fundamental reform
of the Indonesian military which continues to abuse human
rights, is unaccountable before Indonesia's flawed judicial
system and which is not subordinate to civilian government
control.
The incoming administration should not provide assistance to
an Indonesian military or an Indonesian intelligence agency
which remain unreformed and unaccountable to the Indonesian
people.
The West Papua Advocacy Team
Charles Farhadian, Phd.
Eben Kirksey, Phd.
Edmund McWilliams (Senior US Foreign Service Officer,
retired)
Octo Mote (Human Rights Asylee)
Miriam Young (Human Rights Advocate)
(Transmitted by Edmund McWilliams, WPAT Secretary, edmcw
@ msn.com), 703-237-3913 - Falls Church, Virginia)
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