Refugee speaks out about the terror tactics of Muslim Indonesia

The Melanesian refugees who recently landed in Australia are both good people and genuine refugees, unfortunately for them

The Indonesian military is using the same tactics of terror in West Papua that were employed during its bloody reign in East Timor, and Australia should step in to mediate a peace settlement, warns separatist Herman Wainggai. Mr Wainggai, the leader of the 43 asylum-seekers who arrived in Australia two weeks ago, said ongoing abuses by the Indonesian military, often in cahoots with militias, were terrifying the indigenous community. "It's the same as with East Timor," he told the Herald yesterday from Christmas Island, where the asylum-seekers are being processed by immigration officials. "They have created militias and jihadis in West Papua. The people, and especially activists for independence, are very scared." The military and police regularly raided campuses and villages searching for independence sympathisers, while Indonesia's intelligence network kept constant tabs on their activities, Mr Wainggai said.

Jailed twice for his political activism, Mr Wainggai said he had no faith in the promise by the Indonesian President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, that, if they returned home, the Papuans would face no reprisals. Many such promises had been made in the past, he said, and bitter experience meant they could not be accepted at face value. "We don't trust Indonesia," he said. "If I was sent back to Indonesia, I would die. The Government and the military treats West Papuans like animals. They have killed us like animals." Incorporated into Indonesia in 1969 after a vote widely discredited as a sham, Papua's distinct Melanesian population has been running a long, unsuccessful campaign for independence. Mr Wainggai said it was now time for other countries, particularly Australia, to take the fate of his people more seriously. "I'm asking the international community to help facilitate a meeting between the Government in Jakarta and West Papuan independence leaders," he said. "This way we can resolve these problems. Our struggle is non-violent. We believe in dialogue but we need a mediator, like the Australian Government."

Dr Yudhoyono's personal intervention in the case of the asylum-seekers - he called John Howard directly to ask for their return - reflects the acute sensitivity in Jakarta about its resource-rich province.

The Greens senator, Kerry Nettle, said Australia should heed the lessons of the past. "This Government likes to talk up its role in East Timor. It was good, but it was also very late," she said. "There's an opportunity to get in here and do something before it's too late."

Dr Yudhoyono has floated a new type of "special autonomy" for West Papua, including the creation of an indigenous upper house of parliament in the province and more development assistance. But it is already unravelling, with promised elections for the body seemingly permanently stalled as the Yudhoyono Government instead hand-picks its members. Mr Wainggai said the enticements of autonomy within the Indonesian republic were not new, and not to be believed. "We have heard this kind of talk so many times. We even heard it with the Act of Free Choice [the 1969 vote] and so many people have died since then, 400,000 people," he said. "We have struggled for independence for 40 years and we struggled for full independence, not another so-called autonomy package."

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