Manokwari, Jubi – The West Papua People’s Assembly (MRPB) has urged the Indonesian Military (TNI) and police and the Immigration Office in Manokwari to immediately take steps to curb illegal gold mining activities in Wasirawi Village, Masni District, Manokwari Regency, which are suspected to have been controlled by foreign parties.
MRPB chair Maxsi Nelson Ahoren said that his party had received complaints from the community who owned the customary land where the gold mining sites were, saying that a number of large investors in the illegal activities were suspected to be non-Indonesian citizens.
“Today we received a visit from a group of indigenous peoples who own customary rights in Wasirawi Village, they suspect that there are foreign parties capitalizing on hundreds of mining workers in the area,” said Maxsi Nelson Ahoren on Tuesday, January 11, 2022.
He said that the gold mining resumed operations in the past two years due to a lack of supervision and control by the government and law enforcement officers in West Papua.
“Between 2016 and 2018, there have been arrests of hundreds of illegal miners including foreigners when the West Papua Police were led by Insp. Gen. Martuani Sormin and XVIII Kasuari Military Command led by Lt. Gen. (Ret) Joppie Onisimus Wayangkau,” he said.
Maxsi Nelson Ahoren said the MRPB would soon hold a meeting with the governor of West Papua, Mankowari regent, and the Arfak Mountains regent to discuss curbing illegal mining activities in the two areas.
Seblon Mandacan, one of the land right owners in Wasirawi, said that hundreds of excavators were used in the mining, posing a threat to forest damage and hydrological functions in the upper of the Wariori River.
“There are hundreds of heavy equipment with more than 3,000 workers at the Wasirawi gold mines. In December 2021, the gold produced from this activity was more than 2 kilograms,” he said.
The Immigration Office Class II Manokwari recorded that throughout 2021 there were 1,237 foreigners from 42 countries in Manokwari, dominated by Filipinos 645 people and 106 Chinese. Head of the Immigration Office Class II Manokwari Iman Teguh Adianto said there was an increase in the issuance of Limited Stay Permits (ITAS) to 1,201 foreigners from 921 in 2020.
Reporter: Hans Kapisa
Editor: Edho Sinaga
2) West Papuan liberation leader announces provisional government's diplomatic missions around the globe
STEVE SWEENEYTUESDAY, JANUARY 11, 2022
WEST Papuan liberation leader Benny Wenda said today that his provisional government is stepping up the fight for justice and freedom from Indonesian rule this year as he announced the opening of diplomatic missions around the globe.
Offices will be established in Britain and Europe, he said, while the headquarters of his “government-in-waiting” will be based in West Papua.
An international office is to be opened in Port Vila in the Pacific island nation of Vanuatu, while a government branch will be established in the Papua New Guinea capital, Port Moresby.
Mr Wenda was elected interim president of a government-in-exile following a “historic meeting” of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) in December 2020.
It issued a number of demands to Indonesian President Joko Widodo, including the withdrawal of all troops from West Papuan territory and a referendum on independence.
Mr Wenda hailed the opening of the new government offices as “another step in our long road to reclaiming the sovereignty stolen from us by Indonesia in 1963.”
The peninsula was formally annexed by Jakarta in the 1969 Act of Free Choice, which was ratified by just over 1,000 handpicked West Papuans, many of whom voted at gunpoint.
“With the formation of our constitution, provisional government, cabinet and Green State Vision, all Indonesian laws in West Papua are over,” Mr Wenda declared. “The Indonesian presence is totally illegal and totally redundant.
“With our clandestine government departments operating within our borders, all West Papuans and Indonesian migrants working under our jurisdiction are now governed by the ULMWP,” he said.
At least 500,000 people are believed to have been killed in the territory since 1969, the majority of them West Papuans.
A 2019 uprising was brutally put down by Indonesian troops and an additional 21,000 soldiers were sent into West Papua as part of what Mr Wenda considers an illegal occupation.
He called on West Papuans and the international community to support his provisional government and to unite “to end our long suffering and complete our 60-year struggle.”
“In 2022, we will redouble all efforts in our long struggle for the liberation of our nation. We will peacefully bring an end to this bloodshed,” Mr Wenda said.
- President Joko Widodo’s administration announced last week that it was cancelling millions of hectares worth of logging, plantation and mining concessions.
- Environmental activists say this presents an opportunity to conserve these lands, which cover a combined area larger than Belgium, by redistributing them to local and Indigenous communities, and protecting areas still home to rainforest.
- However, some senior government officials say the concessions should be reissued to other companies to develop, and indicate that lands redistributed to communities will also be open to investors…...
- https://news.mongabay.com/2022/01/as-indonesia-retakes-land-from-developers-conservation-is-an-afterthought/
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