{"id":146158,"date":"2021-05-02T10:57:24","date_gmt":"2021-05-02T10:57:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?p=57144"},"modified":"2021-05-02T10:57:24","modified_gmt":"2021-05-02T10:57:24","slug":"police-arrest-15-papuan-students-at-peaceful-may-day-rally-in-jakarta-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/05\/02\/police-arrest-15-papuan-students-at-peaceful-may-day-rally-in-jakarta-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Police arrest 15 Papuan students at peaceful May Day rally in Jakarta"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>By Yogi Ernes in Jakarta<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Indonesian police have seized 15 Papuan students among scores arrested at a May Day rally in central Jakarta on the ground that they did not have a permit to demonstrate.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Yes, 15 people were secured and taken to the Metro Jaya regional police [headquarters]. They wanted to protest without a permit,&#8221; said Metro Jaya regional police spokesperson Senior Commissioner Yusri Yunus.<\/p>\n<p>The students were arrested yesterday as they marched past the US Embassy on Jl Medan Merdeka Selatan in central Jakarta. They were taken to the Metro Jaya headquarters.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/gallery\/2021\/5\/1\/may-day-protesters-demand-workers-rights-amid-pandemic\"><strong>READ MORE:<\/strong> May Day protesters demand workers\u2019 rights amid pandemic<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2021\/5\/1\/scuffles-arrests-in-paris-as-thousands-mark-may-day\">France: Scuffles and arrests in Paris as thousands mark May Day<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>According to Yunus, when they were questioned by officers at the location, the Papuan students were unable to produce a permit for the action.<\/p>\n<p>Yunus said that the 15 students were not carrying any suspicious objects and because of this they had now been sent home.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve now sent them home. Earlier we just collected data on them,&#8221; said Yunus.<\/p>\n<p>The rallies in Jakarta were centred on the Horse Statue area.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Thousands took to streets<\/strong><br \/>\nThousands of workers from various different trade unions took to the streets to convey their aspirations.<\/p>\n<p>The workers took up a number of demands, one of which was cancelling the Job Creation Law which they say harms workers.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnnindonesia.com\/nasional\/20210501201715-12-637390\/97-orang-ditangkap-saat-demo-hari-buruh-di-jakarta\">CNN Indonesia reports<\/a> that up to 300 people were arrested in rallies near the Horse Statue and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) offices in central Jakarta.<\/p>\n<p>The figures on the arrests were obtained by summarising statements made by police up until the May Day actions ended at 5.05 pm.<\/p>\n<p>The first arrests were the 15 Papuan students.<\/p>\n<p>Following this, police arrested 12 anarchists.<\/p>\n<p>Senior Commissioner Yunus said that the group was arrested as they wanted to join protesting workers in front of the ILO office.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;12 young anarchists were arrested,&#8221; said Yunus.<\/p>\n<p>Yunus said they were arrested because it was suspected that they wanted to &#8220;create a riot&#8221; during the labour protests.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;As is usual with them there were suspicions they wanted to create a riot, so we secured them, we questioned them&#8221;, said Yunus.<\/p>\n<p>Thirty students from the Indonesian Association of Catholic Students (PMKRI) were also arrested.<\/p>\n<p>Central Jakarta District police deputy chief Assistant Superintendant Setyo Koes Hariyanto said the students were arrested as they tried to incite chaos by setting fire to tyres.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Women protesters arrested<\/strong><br \/>\nIn Medan, North Sumatra, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnnindonesia.com\/nasional\/20210501233303-20-637412\/14-peserta-aksi-may-day-di-medan-ditangkap-polisi\">CNN Indonesia reports<\/a> that Medan metropolitan district police (Polrestabes) arrested 14 protesters seven women and seven men &#8211; the from the People&#8217;s Resistance Alliance for the Destruction of Tyranny.<\/p>\n<p>Medan Legal Aid Foundation (LBH) labour and urban poor division head Maswan Tambak said there were no grounds for the repressive action by police against the peaceful protest.<\/p>\n<p>In addition, the protesters did not violate covid-19 health protocols.<\/p>\n<p>Protesters from the Medan People and Workers Accumulation of Anger Alliance (AKBR) acused rogue police officers of intimidating and sexually harassing them.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There were police who recorded demonstrators by sticking their mobile phones in the face of women protesters. It really wasn&#8217;t ethical, and we consider that threatening,&#8221; said the founder of Women Today (PHI), Lusty Ro Manna Malau.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The actions of these rogue police cannot be allowed to become normalised.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><em>Translated by James Balowski for Indoleft News. The original title of the article was <a href=\"https:\/\/news.detik.com\/berita\/d-5553757\/polisi-amankan-15-mahasiswa-papua-di-demo-hari-buruh-di-jakarta\">&#8220;Polisi Amankan 15 Mahasiswa Papua di Demo Hari Buruh di Jakarta&#8221;<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<style>.pf-button.pf-button-excerpt { display: none; }<\/style>\n<p class=\"syndicated-attribution\">This post was originally published on <a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/2021\/05\/02\/police-arrest-15-papuan-students-at-peaceful-may-day-rally-in-jakarta\/\">Asia Pacific Report<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Yogi Ernes in Jakarta Indonesian police have seized 15 Papuan students among scores arrested at a May Day rally in central Jakarta on the ground that they did not have a permit to demonstrate. \u201cYes, 15 people were secured and taken to the Metro Jaya regional police [headquarters]. They wanted to protest without a<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":400,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,21848,6,15166,207,21849,1721,21850,906,4738,12,13,14,2862,35,1833,19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146158"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/400"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146158"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146158\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":146159,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146158\/revisions\/146159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}