By Prof. Jose Maria Sison
Chairperson
International League of Peoples’ Struggle
22 December 2011
We, the International League of Peoples’ Struggle, condemn in the
strongest terms the Indonesian military and police forces for barbaric
attacks on the people of West Papua, particularly in the large area of
Paniai since December 13.
Human rights organizations have reported that scores of West Papuans
have been killed and wounded. Twenty-seven villages have been razed to
the ground. Over 20,000 people have been forced to evacuate more than
130 villages and are vulnerable to hunger and disease. The attacks have
been carried out by Indonesian ground forces and by helicopter gunships.
Involved in the attacks are more than four combat battalions of
Indonesian army (TNI) Kostrad commandos from Battalion 753, Brimob
paramilitary police, and elite counter-terrorism troops from Detachment
88– all units armed, trained, and supplied by the Australian and US
governments.
Since April 2011, they have been deployed to encircle the alleged
headquarters of the Paniai Free Papua National Liberation Army
(TPN-OPM), under the command of General Jhon Yogi. They have been
dropped by helicopters into 26 villages around the suspected TPN-OPM
headquarters.
But the ongoing attacks have failed to entrap and destroy the TPN-OPM
They have served to carry out Djakarta’s genocidal policy to massacre
and displace the people from their homes and land. The TPN-OPN have
inflicted casualties on the Indonesian military and police forces by
carrying out guerrilla tactics.
Human rights defenders in West Papua have accused the Australian
Government and the Australian-owned mining company, Paniai Gold, of
being materially interested and actively involved in the ongoing attacks
on the people of West Papua. Detachment 88 is a special force trained
and armed by both the US and Australian military. It has abducted,
tortured and murdered ordinary West Papuans far more than members of the
TPN-OPM.
In the current military operations, the Indonesian military and police
have used helicopters belonging to the Derewo River Gold (DRG) project,
which is operated by Paniai Gold and fully owned by Melbourne-based gold
mining company West Wits Mining. The corrupt and brutal Indonesian
state is a puppet of Australian and US multinational companies.
The International League of Peoples’ Struggle supports the people of
West Papua in upholding and defending their right to self-determination
as a community against the oppressive state of Indonesia and its
imperialist masters. The Indonesian state has no right to inflict gross
and systematic human rights violations on individuals, groups or entire
communities. The sovereign right of the people to wage revolution and
overthrow an oppressive state is no different from or is quite similar
to the right to secede or separate from it.
In the revolutionary process, the people (be they of the entire
Indonesia or West Papua in particular) separate themselves from an
oppressive state and establish a new state that brings about just and
harmonious relations. In the course of people’s war, local organs of
political power are first established and become developed before they
can replace the old reactionary state. ###
