Indonesia is bolstering its military presence in disputed Papua province, following the assassination of a senior military officer on April 26.
On Sunday, Indonesian media outlets reported that the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI) had deployed 400 members of the elite Infantry Battalion 315 to Papua after the completion of a month of special training at the end of April.
Nicknamed pasukan setan, or “Satan’s forces” in Indonesian, the battalion has previously taken part in conflicts in East Timor and Aceh. A video, purported to feature the battalion executing a series of menacing drills on arrival in Papua, also surfaced on social media on May 1.
The deployment follows an April 26 attack in which Papuan separatist rebels ambushed and assassinated Brig. Gen. Gusti Putu Danny Nugraha, the head of Indonesia’s intelligence agency in the eastern province.
The ambush took place as Gusti was on a tour of Puncak Regency, in Papua’s central highlands, following a series of attacks by Papuan separatists in the vicinity last month. Responsibility for the assassination was later claimed by the West Papua National Liberation Army (WPNLA) the military wing of the Free Papua Organization (Organisasi Papua Merdeka, OPM), which spearheads the struggle for Papuan independence.
As Bilveer Singh noted in these pages this week, past history suggests that Gusti’s killing is likely to prompt violent reprisals from the Indonesian security apparatus. President Joko Widodo’s government immediately vowed to avenge the killing, ordering the police and military “to chase and arrest” all rebels involved: “I want to emphasize again that there is no place for armed groups in Papua,” he said.
Amid the latest deployment, internet services in Jayapura, the capital of Indonesia’s Papua province, were cut last Friday, in an apparent repeat of 2019, when the government shut down internet service in Papua region during weeks of protests and deadly unrest between August and September that year. Victoria Koman, an exiled Indonesian rights activist, said yesterday that she had received reports that mobile and internet services in Puncak have also been disrupted.
In another sign of the increasing tensions in the region, Indonesia’s Coordinating Minister for Security, Politics, and Legal Affairs Mahfud MD responded to the assassination of April 26 by officially branding the WPNLA and other armed Papuan resistance groups “terrorists.” The government, military, and much of the Indonesian media, typically refers to regional separatists in Papua as Kelompok Kriminal Bersenjata (KKB), or “armed criminal group.”
Papua has important political ramifications for the Indonesian government and TNI, which has fought a raft of regional separatist rebellions since the 1950s, and fears that a loss of Papua might prompt other regions to increase their bids for autonomy, or even independence, from Jakarta. But the real reason may be money. As the journalist Duncan Graham noted this week, Papua also happens to contain the world’s sixth-largest gold mine and second-largest copper mine, in addition to a bounty of other natural resources.
In this context, the labeling of Papuan rebels as “terrorists” fulfills the important function of anathematizing their calls for autonomy and justifying the extraction of natural resources from the area. It certainly won’t lead to peace.
Usman Hamid, the executive director of Amnesty International Indonesia told local media on April 29 that the government should focus instead on the estimated 80 people that his organization identified as victims of extrajudicial killings committed by Indonesian security forces in Papua between February 2018 and December 2020.
“The government should focus on investigating these cases and ending the extrajudicial killings and other human rights violations by law enforcement agencies in Papua and West Papua, rather than focus on the terrorist label,” Usman said.
As it stands, a familiar pattern seems likely to persist: the TNI responding to separatist activities with military crackdowns, which further embitter the population against the central authorities and deepen the OPM’s resolve to achieve independence – by whatever means necessary.
CHURCH human rights activists have demanded an end to violence and killing in Indonesia’s easternmost Papua and West Papua provinces following an escalation of rebel attacks and a military crackdown.
“This violence reached new heights with the killing of a senior Indonesian intelligence officer in West Papua a few days ago,” Brisbane archdiocese’s Catholic Justice and Peace Commission executive officer Peter Arndt said.
The killing of the Papua Regional Intelligence Agency head, I Gusti Putu Danny Karya Nugraha, on April 25, was blamed on separatists who have conducted a decades-long insurgency against Indonesian rule.
A senior Catholic official in Papua, Fr Marthen Kuayo, apostolic administrator of Timika Diocese called for a ceasefire after the Indonesian Government ordered a “crackdown” on the separatist West Papua National Liberation Army and the Free Papua Movement (TPNPB-OPM) and branded the groups as terrorists.
Indonesian security forces first set foot in Papua in the early 1960s.
“Since that day up to the present, the peoples of West Papua have lived with much violence, repression and marginalisation,” Mr Arndt, who has visited the troubled region and documented abuses there, said.
“We understand the immense frustration and anger that so many Papuans feel after decades of this injustice and thousands and thousands of lives lost.”
Thousands of Papuans have fled their villages in the past two years to escape sweeping operations and violence by Indonesian security forces.
“These internally displaced women, men and children are very vulnerable and have faced deprivation and even death despite the efforts by churches and community organisations and groups to provide them with support,” Mr Arndt said.
In February, Catholic leaders in Papua province signed a letter appealing for an end to the ongoing conflict between the military and separatist groups.
Their call followed criticism by priests and laypeople of the way bishops and the Indonesian Bishops’ Conference had turned a blind eye to the rising conflict, including an incident in Intan Jaya and Puncak district in which a soldier, a man accused of being a military spy and three civilians were killed, forcing thousands forced to flee.
“Violent struggle will never succeed. Violence will give birth to violence again and so continue. Therefore we urge all parties to stop the violence,” the Catholic leaders wrote.
Their letter was signed by Bishop Leo Laba Ladjar of Jayapura, Bishop Aloysius Murwito of Agats, Father Marthen Kuayo, apostolic administrator of Timika Diocese, and Father Hengky Kariwop, vicar general of Merauke Archdiocese.
Mr Arndt urged the Australian Government to press Indonesia to end its security approach in West Papua, and for the United Nations and other governments to intervene for peace.
“We urge Catholics, our fellow Christians and people of faith to join with Papuan churches in seeking God’s mercy through prayer and fasting,” he said.
“We also ask them to approach their federal members of parliament and senators to urge them to encourage the Australian Government to engage with the Indonesian Government and other governments, especially in the Pacific, to pursue this alternative course.
“We will continue to communicate with our Catholic and Protestant sisters and brothers in West Papua to offer them our support and solidarity.
“May our loving and merciful God bless the people of West Papua with peace.”
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