Tuesday, October 22, 2013

1) Former Liberal MP attacks Australia's treatment of West Papuans



1) Former Liberal MP attacks Australia's treatment of West Papuans
2Papuan Governor to Revoke 50 Logging, Mining and Plantation Permits
3) China’s 69 Trillion Rupiah Investment in Papua and Kalimantan

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1) Former Liberal MP attacks Australia's treatment of West Papuans

'We’re not even offering to share part of the burden with some of the poorest countries in our region,' says Judi Moylan

Former Liberal MP Judi Moylan has hit out at the Abbott government over its treatment of seven West Papuan asylum seekers who arrived by boat in the Torres Strait last month.
The seven, including a woman and a 10-year-old child, told customs officials when they landed in Australia on 24 September that they feared for their lives after taking part in a protest against Indonesian human rights abuses in West Papua. But their claims for asylum were ignored and they were swiftly deported to neighbouring Papua New Guinea, where they were handed over to local immigration officials.
Moylan described the move as “extraordinary”.
“I mean, we’ve just completely trashed our commitment to the UN [refugee] convention and to the convention on human rights,” she told Guardian Australia.
“We’re not even offering to share part of the burden with some of the poorest countries in our region now. We’re saying: we won’t allow any asylum seeker who comes by boat to set foot on our territory.”
The West Papuans have since been transferred to a settlement near the PNG-Indonesian border where a community of West Papuan refugees lives a mostly subsistence existence, too afraid to return home but without citizenship rights in PNG.
Guardian Australia spoke with one of the group, Yacob Mechrian Mandabayan, on Monday night.
“This place is not like detention centre,” he said on the phone from the remote PNG camp. “It’s hard for everything: it's hard for food, hard for transport, hard for clean water and power, it’s very hard to find a toilet here.”
At the camp, Mandabayan said the group had been placed in a house that had not been occupied in six years and was in a state of disrepair. He said they were afraid because the settlement was so close to the Indonesian border and there was no security or police officers. “It’s very difficult to live in here and it’s not safe,” he said.
Judi Moylan was one of a “gang of four” Coalition MPs who spoke out against the former Howard government’s increasingly draconian border policy in 2005.
In 2006, after 43 West Papuans arrived in an outrigger canoe and successfully sought asylum in Australia, the Howard government tried to quell a backlash from Indonesia by expanding its offshore processing regime to prevent similar incidents.
Moylan gave a speech to parliament in response, in which she described diplomatic pressure from the Indonesian government over the West Papuan asylum seekers as “offensive to our style of democratic government and to the rule of law which underpins it”.
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2) Papuan Governor to Revoke 50 Logging, Mining and Plantation Permits

Around 50-60 permits for forest management, mining and even plantations which were issued by Papua’s two caretaker governors over the last two years are going to be revoked. “A caretaker governor does not have the authority to issue permits, their duty is only to prepare local elections to choose the definitive governor,” said Lukas Enembe, the Governor of Papua Province, on Friday 11th October 2013.
The election for the Governor of Papua Province was delayed for two years and during that time 60 forestry, mining and plantation companies received permits to start operations in Papua.
“In the end monopolies have arisen over natural resources, land and forests. The mechanism must be regulated so that no one company or corporate group has a monopoly. A caretaker does not have the right to do this., and so they have contravened the law. I have signed a document meaning that those companies can no longer operate in Papua.”
Last August, Enembe wrote to the Forestry Ministry calling for a halt to 13 of the 25 timber utilization permits from natural forests (IUPHHK-HA) that are currently in force in Papua , covering an area of 2,083,091 hectares.
The Governor will also evaluate 42 gold mining companies in Degeuwo, all of which are illegal. “Really we should already have intervened in this area. Although the Governor ha previously issued an instruction to shut the mines, but the regency governments haven’t carried it out. What’s going on there?” asked the Secretary of the Papuan Provincial Mining and Energy Agency, Fred Boray.
The Degeuwo mining area, which was first opened in 2002, is located across four government districts: Nabire, Paniai, Intan Jaya and Deiyai Regencies. There are currently 42 companies operating, but only six have permits.
Papua province covers an area of around 32,757,948 hectares, of which 31,738,931 hectares (97.89%) is land area. Land classified as production forest or limited production forest is around 10,700,567 hectares, and timber utilization permits have been issued for 4,989,783 hectares.
The governor has requested Regency leaders (bupatis) not to issue permits that will result in forest destruction. The reason is that damage to the forest will not bring any positive contribution to people’s lives. “For example, the oil palm plantations in Keerom Regency that are no longer productive. Because of that, I ask all the bupatis not to give out permits too freely, they should look at the seriousness of the investor,” said Enembe.
[awasMIFEE note: no info as yet which of the plantation permits are likely to be cancelled as a result of this decision. It is not expected that any of the MIFEE plantations will be affected. On the other hand, in Nabire, leader of the Yerisiam Tribe, Simon Petrus Hanebora welcomed the news, hoping that it would mean that PT Nabire Baru and PT Sariwana Unggul Mandiri would have their permits revoked. The two companies have been accused of illegally clearing the Yerisiam people's ancestral land.]
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3) China’s 69 Trillion Rupiah Investment in Papua and Kalimantan

A deal was signed between Indonesia and China as world leaders met in Bali two weeks ago for the APEC summit, for a huge 69 trillion Rupiah (over 6 billion US$) investment deal, which obviously has the potential to bring huge changes to Papua and Kalimantan. Below is a report translated from tabloid JubiOther media have quoted Papua Governor Lukus Enembe as stating that aside from infrastructure development, energy and gas is also part of the deal.

69 Trillion Rupiah For Papua and Kalimantan

Jayapura, 10/10 Funds worth 69 trillion Rupiah have been obtained as the result of a bilateral co-operation for investment in Indonesia, agreed between Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the President of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping. The money is destined for provinces in Papua and Kalimantan.
“This 69 trillion Rupiah from China is to be invested in Papua and Kalimantan. We don’t yet know how much of it China is going to invest in the Land of Papua,” said the Chief of Public Relations and protocol of Papua’s Provincial Secretariat, F.X. Mote to reporters in Jayapura on Thursday 10th October.
This budget has been allocated as an investment from the Chinese Government to develop Papua, in particular hard and soft infrastructure. Hard infrastructure means roads and bridges, ports, electricity, clean water and so on.
Meanwhile soft infrastructure means improving the quality of human resources across various sectors, such as education, health, engineering and so on. “This is also proof that the Papuan Provncial Government is making integrated plans for the future together with the Chinese Government, and is building Papua in the spirit of mutual assistance.” he explained.
To that end the Papuan Governor hopes that all local government units and stakeholders throughout Papua Province will move quickly to plan programs that are in accordance with the MoU signed between the two governments.
Aside from that, his wish is that all parties will ensure their local environments are secure and welcoming, so that all investment programs which are focussed on the Papuan people can run optimally, increasing the dignity of the Papuan people, aiming for a Papua that is advancing, autonomous and prosperous.
Previously, the Vice President Director of the Indika Energy Group, Arsjad Rasjid had explained that this was an attempt to build up a working relationship between China and Indonesia. Because at this time that is what China is also seeking. Since China has become over-capacity, it has to look for ways to invest beyond its borders.
“After realising this, one area which especially caught their interest was Indonesia, and Papua in particular. That is where development could really be a big help due to China’s experience in the economic sector, and the infrastructure development which they have carried out so rapidly over the least 20 years,” said Arsjad.
Their focus will be to develop Papua’s infrastructure. Because the infrastructure sector is being pushed now everywhere, as well as Indonesia in particular. If infrastructure is improved, many things become easier.
“There are two kinds of infrastructure, soft and hard. Hard means building roads, power stations ports and so on, while soft refers to human development and education. So that means we will try to develop these two kinds of infrastructure in Papua – both natural resources and human resources. However, this requires quite a long process, from the initial planning we have to do now. Apart from that we also have to see how the process of co-operating with local governments will pan out, and how they will see this”, he explained.
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