OPM welcomes UN’s call for humanitarian aid and calls for Security Council intervention
9 March 2022
The Free Papua Movement / Organisasi Papua Merdeka (TPNPB-OPM) welcomes the statement by the United Nations ‘Joint Communication from Special Procedures’ by the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions and the Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons dispatched to the Indonesian Ambassador dated 27 December 2021,[1] the follow-up United Nations statement of 1 March 2022 titled ‘Indonesia: UN experts sound alarm on serious Papua abuses, call for urgent aid’,[2] and the UN News article titled ‘Indonesia: Shocking abuses against indigenous Papuans, rights experts report’.[3]
As detailed in these documents, the United Nations recognise:
- The ongoing war for liberation being waged by the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB-OPM) against the occupying Indonesian military;
- The West Papuan people’s ongoing entitlement to self-determination;
- Ongoing extrajudicial killings, including children as young as two years of age;
- The ongoing torture of civilians;
- The ongoing disappearances (and logical killing) of civilians after having been taken into custody by members of Indonesia’s military;
- The “60,000 to 100,000” internally displaced people since the escalation of violence in December 2018; and,
- The plight of these displaced civilians suffering exposure, hunger, malnutrition, lack of healthcare and education facilities causing immense suffering and many deaths.
Indeed, following the UN Joint Statement to Indonesia demanding action, human rights atrocities have continued. As recently as 22 February 2022, a 12-year old boy Makilon Tabuni was tortured to death by the Indonesian military after being accused of stealing a weapon which ‘disappeared’ at Sinak airport, Puncak in Papua province.[4] We have since been informed that members of Indonesia’s military had left their weapons unattended while they joined the children playing computer games. Blaming and then torturing innocent children for their own lack of discipline is yet further evidence of Indonesia’s ongoing human rights violations. Legal scholars as well as reports by the United Nations describe Indonesia’s ongoing human rights violations in West Papua as meeting the definition of genocide and crimes against humanity.[5] After 60 years it is surely time this suffering ceased!
The Free Papua Movement again reminds member states of their obligation under UN resolution 2621 ‘Programme of action for the full implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples’ to provide “both moral and material assistance”.[6] In the absence of member states obligation to assist, the Free Papua Movement requests all communities and peoples of the world to support our struggle for freedom and assist in any way you can.[7]
Please end the ongoing misery, oppression and genocide that has caused the deaths of an estimated one million people since the United Nations transferred administration of our lands to Indonesia in 1963. The sham “act of free choice” in 1969 where Indonesia hand-picked and threatened at gun-point 0.1 percent of the Papuan population to vote for integration into Indonesia is in clear breach of Principle IX of United Nations resolution 1541 requiring universal suffrage.[8] The Free Papua Movement again reiterates the West Papuan people’s right to self-determination, freedom and independence as recognised by international law governed by the Charter of the United Nations and associated UN resolutions.
As the Free Papua Movement warned Indonesia nearly 12 months ago:[9]
Unlike the Indonesian military, the TPNPB freedom fighters never attack the Indonesian civilian population however, if Indonesia continues their programme of terror and genocide upon West Papua’s civilian population (as has occurred for nearly sixty years now) and the international community does not intervene, OPM’s TPNPB freedom fighters will announce a campaign to wipe out not just the illegally occupying Indonesian military but also the illegal Javanese and other Indonesian settlers who increasingly steal the sacred land and resources of the West Papuan people.
In light of Indonesia’s ongoing programme of terror and genocide, and the failure of the United Nations and international community to intervene thus far, OPM’s TPNPB freedom fighters announced our military campaign on 8 June 2021 targeting not only high-ranking Indonesian military officials and soldiers but all Indonesians in the war zones of West Papua.[10] The targeting of Indonesian government employees erecting communication facilities in Beoga, Puncak is the launch of this new campaign.
The Free Papua Movement strongly advises all Javanese and other Indonesians residing in West Papua to immediately return to your homeland if you do not wish to be targeted by our TPNPB-OPM guerrilla freedom fighters and condemns the Indonesian governments denial of its human rights atrocities.[11]
In light of Indonesia’s continuing oppression, the Free Papua Movement again requests this international conflict be referred to the United Nations Security Council, [12] and seeks moral and material support from member states, and indeed all people able and willing to assist.
Amatus Akouboo Douw
Chairman of Diplomatic Council
TPNPB-OPM / Free Papua Movement
[1]https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId=26909
[2]https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=28180&LangID=E
[3] https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/03/1113062
[4] Indonesian Military Probes Death of Papuan Child ‘Tortured’ Over Alleged Firearm Theft, Victor Mambor and Arie Firdaus, Benar News, 24 February, 2022. https://www.benarnews.org/english/news/indonesian/indonesian-military-probes-death-of-papuan-child-said-to-be-be-tortured-over-alleged-firearm-theft-03012022133958.html
[5] Elizabeth Brundige, Winter King, Priyneha Vahali, Stephen Vladeck, & Xiang Yuan, 2004, ‘Indonesian Human Rights Abuses in West Papua: Application of the Law of Genocide to the History of Indonesian Control,’ Yale Law School, https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/documents/pdf/Intellectual_Life/West_Papua_final_report.pdf ;Jim Elmslie, & Cammi Webb-Gannon, ‘A Slow-Motion Genocide: Indonesian Rule in West Papua,’ Griffith Journal of Law & Human Dignity, vol. 1, no. 2:142–166, (2013), https://griffithlawjournal.org/index.php/gjlhd/article/view/578/539; John Wing with Peter King, ‘Genocide in West Papua? The Role of the Indonesian State Apparatus and a Current Needs Assessment of the Papuan People,’ Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies and ELSHAM Jayapura, August, 2005, https://www.worldcat.org/title/genocide-in-west-papua-the-role-of-the-indonesian-state-apparatus-and-a-current-needs-assessment-of-the-papuan-people/oclc/65526525
V. Toki, ‘Study on Decolonisation in the Pacific region’, Permanent Forum on Indigenous issues, Twelfth Session, UN Doc E/C.19/2013/12, 20 February 2013, https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N13/238/49/PDF/N1323849.pdf?OpenElement
[6] ‘Programme of action for the full implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples’, GA Res 2621 (XXV), UN GAOR, 25th sess, 1862nd plen mtg, UN Doc A/8086, (12 October 1970), https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/RESOLUTION/GEN/NR0/348/86/IMG/NR034886.pdf?OpenElement
[7] Free Papua Movement, Contact us, https://freepapuamovement.org/contact-us/
[8] United Nations resolution 1541, Doc A/Res/1541 (15 December 1960)
[9] Press Release, Free Papua Movement, 30 April 2021, https://freepapuamovement.org/press-release/
[10] TPNPB-OPM Minta Pekerja Tinggalkan Wilayah Perang https://www.republika.co.id/berita/qubw7c396/tpnpbopm-minta-pekerja-tinggalkan-wilayah-perang
[11] UN experts call for probe into rights abuses in Indonesia’s east, Vatican News, 3 March 2022. https://www.vaticannews.va/en/world/news/2022-03/indonesia-un-experts-rights-abuse-papua-west-papua.html
[12] Campaign Launch, ‘United Nations Security Council Intervention for West Papua’, 26 June 2021, Brisbane, Australia. https://freepapuamovement.org/united-nations-security-council-intervention-for-west-papua-has-launched-2021/
9 March 2022 The Free Papua Movement / Organisasi Papua Merdeka (TPNPB-OPM) welcomes the statement by the United Nations ‘Joint Communication from Special Procedures’ by the Special Rapporteur on…