Sat, 02/10/2007 - 11:12 — Dewa Adat Biak, West Papua

Six West Papuan Student activists from the Student and Civil Society Coalition Concerned about Human Rights in Papua (Koalisi Mahasiswa dan Masyarakat Peduli HAM di Papua) were arrested and detained by Indonesian Police during a demonstration of around 60 people outside the front of the provincial parliament building in Jayapura on Tuesday the 7th of February 2007.

Student organiser Marthen Goo, who was one of the six detained, said the protesters want nine political prisoners currently in jail in Makasar, Sulawesi to be transferred back to a prison in Jayapura where they can be closer to family and friends.

“The nine political prisoners are in a poor psychological state after being subjected to intimidation and racist taunts” says Mr. Goo.

The nine are in jail after being found guilty by an Indonesian court of involvement in a raid on an arms depot at a military base in Wamena, in the West Papuan highlands in 2004. After the raid the Indonesian military carried out sweeping operations that resulted in extrajudicial killings, the burning of villages, and destruction of food gardens. Human rights activists and Church leaders said that the military operations caused many villagers to flee to the surrounding mountains and forests where some later died of starvation.

Marthen Goo said that the nine detained in Makasar were not involved in the raid on the arms depot. “They are ordinary people, they don't know anything, but were arrested and forced to confess” said Mr. Goo.

“They were terrorised and afraid of being killed if they didn't confess to carrying out the crime, but in actual fact they had nothing to do with it.
They are ordinary people who only know about going to their food gardens to garden” said Mr. Goo.

Members of the Student and Civil Society Coalition Concerned about Human Rights in Papua want the Provincial Government in West Papua to put pressure on Jakarta to move the political prisoners back to West Papua .

The students were detained and questioned by Police for little over an hour before being released by Police. Once released the students immediately resumed their nonviolent protest.

The demonstration comes a week after Eko Berotabui, a student activist and political prisoner jailed after student demonstrations in the capital in March 2006, died in Police custody, allegedly after an overdose.

West Papua activists hold grave concerns for the wellbeing of all West Papuan political prisoners held in West Papua, Makasar and Jakarta . Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have documented that torture is routinely used by Indonesian Police and that West Papuan activists are especially singled out for persecution on the basis of race.