Solidarity rally for West Papua

https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/solidarity-rally-west-papua

Green Left Weekly

Solidarity rally for West Papua

Sydney

Friday, October 7, 2016

About 50 people rallied on October 2 in a show of solidarity with the peoples of West Papua, and to protest the ongoing genocide and dispossession that has been carried out by a rapacious Indonesian state against the Indigenous population since the 1960s.

After some spirited speeches, including by members of the small local West Papuan community in exile, the rally set off for a short march from Town Hall to the New South Wales Parliament.

The rally also expressed its support for:

• West Papua's bid for full membership in the Melanesian Spearhead Group;
• Human rights monitoring and open access to foreign journalists in West Papua;
• An independent fact finding mission into West Papua;
• The abolition or amendment of the Lombok Treaty;
• Assistance for the West Papuan Refugees in PNG; and a
• A United Nations-supervised referendum in West Papua.