Hi Weez,
The arrival of 42 Papuans in Australia has been indeed triggering public debate in both countries. This issue is politically sensitive. For Indonesian politician, any criticism directed toward Australian could be used by them to justify that national integrity is under threat. Many Australians perhaps saw this decision of granting visa as a step to repeat a great success in campaigning for East Timor independence.
I totally condemn any human rights violation that has been taking place in Papua and other islands.
But it is quite interesting to examine why some Australians are so keen to help Papuan on the basis of human rights violations. Peoples like Siti Wainggai are commonly found in every political violence that has been happening or happened in Indonesia. This is based on my experience of carrying out human rights violation campaign in Indonesia. In every conflict women and children are the most vulnerable victims.

regards
citu

G’day Citu, nice to see you back!

You said: “Many Australians perhaps saw this decision of granting visa as a step to repeat a great success in campaigning for East Timor independence.”

If Indonesian politicians are thinking that Australia would like to take over Papua (as was depicted by the cartoon showing Howard and Downer as humping dogs), this notion seems to be unfounded. Australia doesn’t even take care of its own Aboriginals; I can’t see Australia having any interest in Papua. However, if oil or natural gas is ever discovered there, I might change that opinion!

I wouldn’t say ‘many’ Australians were seeing this as a step toward independence for Papua. Most Australians are barely aware Papua exists (outside of a few human rights campaigners), much less aware of the difficulties the Papuans are having with the Indonesian government. Most Australians were quite surprised to have the 42 Papuans show up on our shores waving banners. Papua wasn’t on our ‘radar’ as it were. The group of 42 did a very effective job in raising awareness of their cause.

If there are human rights violations going on in Papua- and there seems to be evidence growing that this is the case, SBY should see to it that it stops. Perhaps Papuans wouldn’t be interested in independence if their grievances were redressed. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem likely, given past experience with TNI & militias in East Timor.

Hi Weez,
You are right. About the claim that many Australians attitude toward the granting of permanent visa was a bit exaggerated providing that they may not care of what happened to Aboriginal people.

I went to a discussion on Papua and Australian Foreign Policy more than few weeks ago. It presented two researcher from Sydney Unin and one Papuan. Honestly i was quite pissed off by these researchers. They seem dont have adequate knowledge on Indonesia but made such scandalous claim that genocide occurred in Papua. I am not denying that gross violation of human rights has been taking place but to label what has been happening as genocide was problematic matter. A thorough investigation is of course needed to be carried out to gain more evidence in order to support that claim.

What more worries me regarding this Papuan issue is some people who know little about Indonesia made some comments that could be misleading for Australian public. One participant in the discussion said that Papuans were murdered by Jamaah Islamiah and these researcher did not make any correction about this erroneous comments. I suspect that anti-terrorist campaign lead to the acts of demonising Islam and it seems that some Australians who support for Papuan independence will have black and white perspective on Papua matter. It is seen as a war between the evil Islam against the innocent indigenous Papuan.

Have a good weeekend!!!

cheers
Citu

As always Citu, thanks for your valued perspective on all things Indonesian.

I am not surprised that some Australian interests would like to blame Jemaah Islamiah for just about everything up to the cracked egg they got from the grocer last week. I’m wary of anyone who wants to point out an Islamic terrorist under every other rock.

Human rights activists must be careful to be accurate in their representations else they find themselves accused of ‘crying wolf.’ Crisis fatigue by media can stultify potential supporters.

I hope I have something good to say soon about Ms Siti’s safety. By comparison, a very quiet weekend here for sure, though. 😉