Not Forgotten -The Biak Massacre

Australia West Papua Association (Sydney) 

Statement  6 July 2020

Not Forgotten -The Biak Massacre

22 years since the Biak massacre

Today  marks 22 years since the Biak Massacre when the Indonesian security forces massacred scores of people in Biak, West Papua.  
The victims, included women and children who had gathered for a peaceful rally. They were killed at the base of a water tower flying the Morning Star flag

On the 2 July  in 1998, the West Papuan Morning Star flag was raised on top of a water tower near the harbour in Biak. Activists and local people gathered beneath it singing songs and holding traditional dances. As the rally continued, many more people in the area joined in with numbers reaching up to 500 people.

On the 6 July the Indonesian security forces attacked the demonstrators, massacring scores of people. The victims included women and children who had gathered for the peaceful gathering  were killed at the base of the water tower. 

Joe Collins of AWPA said, “22 years after the Biak massacre no Indonesian security force member has been charged or brought to justice for the human rights abuses committed against peaceful demonstrators”. 

Collins said  that "Recently Australia was one of 27 countries that issued a joint statement at the Human Rights Council which Called  for an urgent investigation of the human rights situation in China, particularly for minorities”

but  “Australia continues to ignore the ongoing human rights abuses in West Papua and makes no statement of concern about the treatment of West Papuans”.

“If the Australian Government thinks that by ignoring the human rights situation in West Papua  it will be forgotten? they are wrong. West Papua is not going away”.

Ends     

Background . 

The Biak Massacre – The Citizens Tribunal -15 Year Anniversary

The Citizens Tribunal for the 15th Anniversary of the Biak Massacre was held on Saturday July 6th at the University of Sydney. Full Video Footage from the Tribunal is now available on the site

http://www.biak-tribunal.org          
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A reflection from a US Senior Foreign Service Officer (now  retired) on situation in Biak at the time

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At the time of the Biak massacre I had been scheduled to fly to Jayapura from Jakarta on a regular visit to West Papua to monitor human rights developments.  Shortly before leaving for Jayapura I heard about an incident in Biak several days earlier.  As the Jakarta - Jayapura flight made a brief refueling stop in Biak, I got off the aircraft and did not reboard.  This gave me several days in Biak to investigate the massacre.  (I caught the returning Jayapura-Jakarta flight several days later.)

I found Biak strangely quiet - few people on the streets or in the market.

The normally friendly Papuans were wary of speaking to me and I noted

many non-Papuans (Javanese) in civilian clothes and many Indonesian military 

on the streets.  I was eventually able to locate one Papuan pastor who would speak

with me.  He described  the massacre along the lines that we have since come to know it. This included removal of many bodies from a water tower site where many protesters 

had gathered.  The bodies were brought to the military port and were put aboard boats and dumped at sea.  

I visited the Water tower and found that much of the area had been freshly painted

and a wall behind the water tower had been resurfaced.  I was looking for bullet

holes as the Pastor's account said that many peaceful protesters had been shot

there.  Finding no marks on the freshly resurfaced walI, I  then examined the legs of the water tower.   There I found clear evidence of bullets.  The bullet marks were for the most part chest high, contradicting subsequent Indonesian military claims that shots fired by the military had been in the air, above the heads of the demonstrators.  

Some time after the Biak incident I again visited the Jayapura area and heard

testimony by Papuans which told of bodies of Papuans which had washed up

on the shores around Jayapura.  They described some of the bodies as having their

hands tied and that some wore Biak T-shirts.  All this refuted Indoensian 

government contentions that the bodies were victims of a tsunami which had

struck villages well to the east of Jayapura. The Biak massacre was of course only one of many of the Indoesian military's merciless assaults on Papuans since the Indonesian occupation of West Papua.

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