An exiled leader of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) has condemned Indonesia’s “cruel and humiliating” arbitrary arrest of 12 West Papuan local farmers in Tambrauw Regency this week and has demanded their release.

According to Human Rights Monitor, the arrests took place on March 18, after Indonesia conducted military operations in the Fef and Bamus Bama districts.

People were dragged out of their homes, tortured, and detained without any warrants or explanation.

“This is how Indonesia treats West Papuans, as less than human,” said ULMWP interim president Benny Wenda in a statement.

“The 12 men arrested in Tambrauw have been labelled TPNPB [West Papua National Liberation Army] and stigmatised as terrorists and criminals by the Indonesian colonisers.

“But who is the real terrorist? These men are the customary landowners, simply defending their forest, their homes, from the military who come to destroy everything.”

Wenda said the Indigenous people had been living there for thousands of years — “long before Indonesia invaded and stole our sovereignty.”

He added: “They didn’t go to Jakarta; Indonesia came to them with bombs and guns.”

Indonesia ‘stolen our resources’
Wenda asked who was the real criminal.

“The people of Tambrauw have been tending their gardens in peace for generations. It is Indonesia who has come and stolen our resources, torn down our forest to plant rice and sugar so people in Jakarta can eat.

“There is no real development in West Papua, only business for Indonesia.”

Wenda said that when he looked at the pictures of the arrested Papuans with their hands tied, forced face down on a police station floor, he saw his own people.

“They represent all West Papuans — humiliated and degraded in their own land.”

Wenda said Indonesia could never defeat the Papuan spirit.

“You can arrest us, torture us, kill us, but the spirit of freedom lives on in every West Papuan,” he said.

Experienced trauma
“Whether they are in the bush, the city, in exile, or even working in the Indonesian government, every West Papuan has experienced trauma at the hands of the Indonesian military and police.

“Every single one of us has an uncle who has been killed, a mother who has been raped, or a brother who has been tortured in police custody.

“We all long for merdeka [freedom]. That is why Indonesia has deployed over 80,000 security forces to terrorise our land — because they are terrified of our desire for freedom.”

As well as demanding that the 12 Papuans be released, Wenda said Indonesia must also finally allow foreign journalists to report on West Papua and immediately facilitate a visit to West Papua by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Such a visit has been promised since 2018, and demanded by 113 countries, including all member states of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), Organisation of African, Caribbean, and Pacific States (OACPS), and the European Commission.