{"id":1502916,"date":"2024-02-16T10:46:08","date_gmt":"2024-02-16T10:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?p=97009"},"modified":"2024-02-16T10:46:08","modified_gmt":"2024-02-16T10:46:08","slug":"wenda-accuses-indonesia-of-more-human-rights-atrocities-in-papua","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2024\/02\/16\/wenda-accuses-indonesia-of-more-human-rights-atrocities-in-papua\/","title":{"rendered":"Wenda accuses Indonesia of more human rights atrocities in Papua"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/\"><em>Asia Pacific Report<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<p>A West Papuan pro-independence leader has accused Indonesia of new human rights atrocities this week while the republic has apparently elected a new president with a past record of violations in Timor-Leste and West Papua.<\/p>\n<p>Indonesian Defence Minister <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/features\/2024\/2\/11\/qa-indonesias-prabowo-subianto-confident-of-election-win\">Prabowo Subianto<\/a> has declared victory in the presidential election on Wednesday after unofficial vote counts showed him with a significant lead over his rivals, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2024\/2\/14\/prabowo-subianto-claims-victory-in-indonesian-presidential-election\">reports Al Jazeera<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The 72-year-old former <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Prabowo_Subianto\">Kopassus special forces commander<\/a>, who had run unsuccessfully for president twice before, was given a dishonourable discharge in 1998 after claims that his force kidnapped and tortured political opponents of Soeharto as his regime crumbled.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2024\/2\/14\/prabowo-subianto-claims-victory-in-indonesian-presidential-election\"><strong>READ MORE:<\/strong> Prabowo Subianto claims victory in Indonesian presidential election<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?s=West+Papua\">Other West Papua reports<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<figure id=\"attachment_30132\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-30132\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-30132 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/prabowo_subianto-Politik-680wide-300x222.jpg\" alt=\"Former Kopassus general Prabowo Subianto\" width=\"300\" height=\"222\" srcset=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/prabowo_subianto-Politik-680wide-300x222.jpg 300w, https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/prabowo_subianto-Politik-680wide-80x60.jpg 80w, https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/prabowo_subianto-Politik-680wide-567x420.jpg 567w, https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/prabowo_subianto-Politik-680wide.jpg 680w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-30132\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Former Kopassus general Prabowo Subianto &#8230; declared victory in Indonesia&#8217;s presidential election this week after unofficial polls gave him at least 57 percent of the vote. Image: Politik<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>He has also been accused of human rights abuses in\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/program\/al-jazeera-correspondent\/2013\/12\/15\/trail-of-murder-indonesias-bloody-retreat\">East Timor<\/a>, which won independence from Indonesia amid the collapse of the Soeharto regime, and also in West <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2023\/6\/5\/new-zealand-pilot-kidnapping-exposes-indonesias-papua-hotspot\">West Papua<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>On the day that Indonesia went to the polls &#8212; Valentine&#8217;s Day, February 14 &#8212; Benny Wenda, president of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP), accused Jakarta&#8217;s military of continuing its &#8220;reign of terror&#8221; in rural West Papua.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The latest tragedy they have inflicted on my people occurred in the Puncak regency,&#8221; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ulmwp.org\/president-wenda-indonesia-tortures-and-kills-west-papuans-in-puncak\">Wenda said in a statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/humanrightsmonitor.org\/case\/security-forces-raid-villages-manggume-aminggaru-yenggernok-and-agiyome-puncak-regency\/\">Military raids on the February 3 and 4<\/a> devastated a number of highland villages.<\/p>\n<p><strong>&#8216;Villagers tortured, houses burnt&#8217;<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;Numerous houses were burnt to the ground, villagers were tortured, and at least one Papuan died from his wounds &#8212; though Indonesian control of information makes it difficult to know whether others were also killed.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Wenda said that &#8220;as always&#8221;, the military had claimed the victims were TPNPB resistance fighters &#8212; &#8220;a grotesque lie, immediately denied by the villagers and their relatives&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Wenda also accused Indonesia of &#8220;hypocrisy&#8221; over Israel&#8217;s war on Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have complete sympathy with [Palestinians over their suffering] in what is happening in Gaza,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;But Indonesian hypocrisy on Palestine cannot be ignored. They are <a href=\"https:\/\/time.com\/6565323\/israel-palestine-occupation-case-international-court-justice-advisory-opinion-indonesia\/\">bringing a legal case<\/a> to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) about Israel\u2019s occupation of Palestine while intensifying their own brutal and bloody military occupation of West Papua.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They are supporting South Africa\u2019s genocide case against Israel at the ICJ while conducting <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ulmwp.org\/benny-wenda-genocide-is-happening-in-west-papua#:~:text=Over%2060%20years%20of%20genocidal,Fakfak%2C%20and%20Yahukimo%20this%20year.\">their own genocide<\/a> in West Papua.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Denying West Papuan rights<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;They are crying about Palestinians\u2019 right to self-determination while continuing to deny West Papuans that same right.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>More than <a href=\"https:\/\/ro.uow.edu.au\/sspapers\/4021\/\">500,000 West Papuans<\/a> have been killed since the occupation began in 1963, says the ULMWP.<\/p>\n<p>In the past six years, more than <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ohchr.org\/en\/press-releases\/2022\/03\/indonesia-un-experts-sound-alarm-serious-papua-abuses-call-urgent-aid\">100,000 Papuans<\/a> were estimated to have been displaced, made refugees in their own land as a result of Indonesian military operations.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Genocide, ecocide, and ethnic cleansing &#8212; West Papuans are victims of all three. The world must pay attention to our plight.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>There were no reports of reaction from the Jakarta authorities.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"syndicated-attribution\">This post was originally published on <a href=\"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/2024\/02\/16\/wenda-accuses-indonesia-of-more-human-rights-atrocities-in-papua\/\">Asia Pacific Report<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Asia Pacific Report A West Papuan pro-independence leader has accused Indonesia of new human rights atrocities this week while the republic has apparently elected a new president with a past record of violations in Timor-Leste and West Papua. Indonesian Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto has declared victory in the presidential election on Wednesday after unofficial vote<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":400,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[789,355,20115,5,12804,434,72321,288,365,6,579,34484,7,207,48268,1217,82,118,10,24328,12,473,14,74350,22208,417,15,1490,1743,418,359,19,209,299],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1502916"}],"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=1502916"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1502916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1504815,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1502916\/revisions\/1504815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1502916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1502916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1502916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}