Asia Times Tuesday, July 13, 2004

U.S. Sacrificed Papua to Court Suharto

By Jim Lobe WASHINGTON, DC - On the 35th anniversary of the so-called “Act of Free Choice” (AFC) that resulted in West Papua’s annexation by Indonesia, newly declassified documents revealed that the administration of the late US president Richard Nixon was unwilling to raise any objections to the process despite its assessment that the move was overwhelmingly opposed by the Papuan people. The documents, released by the independent Washington-based National Security Archive (NSA) on Friday, show that Washington’s Cold War courtship of General Suharto, who had come to power in a military coup d’etat in 1966 and ruled Indonesia with an iron fist until his ouster in 1998, was considered a much higher priority than a plebiscite on independence, “which would be meaningless among the Stone Age cultures of New Guinea”, according to a memo sent by then-national security adviser Henry Kissinger to Nixon on the eve of a meeting with the Indonesian strongman in Jakarta in June 1969. The presidential trip coincided with the AFC voting by which Indonesia legitimized its annexation of the territory of West Irian, now known as West Papua - the western half of the South Pacific island of New Guinea. The province was annexed from the Dutch in 1969 and renamed Irian Jaya (West Irian) under Suharto. The area was granted limited autonomy in 2001, and in 2002 the provincial government adopted the name West Papua for the province. The eastern half of the island comprises the independent nation of Papua New Guinea.

“You should tell [Suharto] that we understand the problems they face in West Irian,” wrote Kissinger, who advised Nixon not to bring up the subject on his own lest Washington be more closely identified with a process it knew to be flawed. The newly released documents, which consist of 11 diplomatic cables and memoranda concerning West Papua from February 1968 through the end of the United Nations-sponsored AFC in August 1969, confirm that Washington was most concerned at the time about Indonesia’s support for US policy in Vietnam and elsewhere in Southeast Asia and saw in Suharto a key ally, despite Jakarta’s official non-alignment policy. Suharto is described in the Kissinger cable as a “moderate military man … who, although indecisive by outside standards, is committed to progress and reform”.

The cables related to West Papua, now Indonesia’s largest province, are also remarkably similar in tone to another batch released by the NSA in 2001 on the reaction of Kissinger and former president Gerald Ford to Indonesia’s planned 1975 invasion of East Timor, a Portuguese colony in the Malay Archipelago that had recently declared itself independent. When Suharto asked for Ford’s “understanding” for the East Timor invasion, according to one secret memorandum cable, Ford replied, “We will understand and not press you on the issue. We understand the problem and the intentions you have.” Kissinger, who accompanied Ford on his trip to Indonesia in December 1975, prior to the invasion, is reported to have told Suharto, “It is important that whatever you do succeeds quickly,” assuring him that if the East Timor invasion went forward, “we will do our best to keep everyone quiet until the president returns home”. Suharto launched the invasion immediately after Ford left Jakarta and annexed the territory the following year.

Over the next several years, as many as one-third of the estimated 750,000 East Timorese died or were killed in counter-insurgency operations by Indonesian forces. When Suharto was ousted almost a quarter of a century later, however, East Timorese voted overwhelmingly for independence in a 1999 referendum, and, despite retaliatory action by the Indonesian military, which destroyed much of the territory’s infrastructure, achieved formal independence last year after a transition period overseen by the United Nations. Like the East Timorese, West Papuans have maintained a low-level insurgency against Indonesian rule since the territory’s annexation. Unlike East Timor, however, West Papua became a key focus of the regime’s transmigration schemes, so that Javanese living in West Papua currently outnumber the indigenous population. In addition, the California-sized territory holds important natural resources, particularly gold, other minerals and timber, which have drawn considerable investment from both Indonesian and Western, including US, companies that are used to dealing with authorities in Jakarta. The newly released documents show that Washington was well aware in 1969 that the vast majority of the estimated 800,000 Papuans opposed annexation by Indonesia, largely because of the violence and repression committed by Indonesian troops that had occupied the former Dutch territory since 1962. Indeed, the US ambassador in Jakarta at the time, Frank Galbraith, wrote in one memo on July 9, 1969, that “possibly 85-90%” of the population “are in sympathy with the Free Papua cause”. He also noted that Indonesian military operations, which had resulted in the deaths of possibly thousands of civilians, “had stimulated fears and rumors of intended genocide among the Irianese”. The AFC, which was endorsed unanimously by 1,022 “representatives” of the Papuan population who were hand-picked by Jakarta, was administered and controlled entirely by Jakarta. The Act was carried out pursuant to a US-brokered 1962 agreement between the Netherlands and Indonesia that awarded control of what was then called West New Guinea to Jakarta subject to its agreement to carry out an election on self-determination, in which all adult Papuans were to be eligible to vote, no later than 1969. Once in control, however, Jakarta quickly moved to repress the independence movement. And if Washington ever intended to hold Jakarta to its pledges about the election process, that sentiment dissipated after Suharto took power in 1966, initiating the killings of an estimated 500,000 suspected communists, and installing economic reforms designed to promote foreign investment. Indeed, the first company to take advantage of a new foreign investment law was the US mining company Freeport Sulphur, which won concessions over vast tracts of land in West Papua. The company, which became Freeport-McMoRan, has been operating the world’s biggest open-pit gold mine in West Papua for some three decades. Although the UN’s observer at the time reported serious violations of the self-determination process - and 15 countries strenuously contested the AFC’s validity - the UN General Assembly “took note” of the AFC’s results, in effect recognizing Indonesia’s annexation. Almost all of the secret US cables assumed, whether explicitly or implicitly, that Jakarta itself would never accept any outcome other than annexation.

One telegram sent early in the six-week AFC period compares the exercise to “a Greek tragedy, the conclusion preordained. The main protagonist, the [government], cannot and will not permit any resolution other than the continued inclusion of West Irian in Indonesia. “Dissident activity,” the author predicts, “is likely to increase, but the Indonesian armed forces will be able to contain and, if necessary, suppress it.” Kissinger himself appeared to understand the fraud, stressing to Nixon that “you should not raise this issue” because “we should avoid any US identification with that act”. At the same time, US officials were doubtful whether even a free plebiscite would make any sense. One 1968 telegram from US Admiral Marshall Green in Jakarta stresses that “we are dealing here essentially with Stone Age illiterate tribal groups” and that “free elections among groups such as this would be more of a farce than any rigged mechanism Indonesia could devise”. At another point Green expresses concern that the UN special representative for West Irian, Ortiz Sanz, might not be sufficiently aware of these “political realities” and should be “made aware” of them. Radio New Zealand International Posted at 08:19 on 13 July, 2004 UTC Indonesia says annexation of Papua fair and final after US release declassified documents

The Indonesian Government says Papua province is an inseparable part of the country and the 1969 United Nations sanctioned vote to integrate was final and can not be reversed. A Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman, Marty Natalegawa, was commenting on newly declassified documents released at the weekend showing that the US gave its support to President Suharto’s takeover. He annexed the province after just over a thousand selected Papuan community leaders voted for integration in a poll overseen by the UN. The vote was later dismissed as a sham by observers. One member of parliament, Djoko, has asked why America has released the documents now, accusing it of trying to create instability in the country. He says the vote for integration was democratic and fair. SBS Dateline July 14, 2004 Interview/Imron Cotan - Indonesia’s Ambassador to Australia -on the release of secret documents on the annexation of West Papua

Earlier today Mark Davis spoke to Indonesia’s Ambassador to Australia, Imron Cotan, from Canberra. MARK DAVIS: Ambassador, thanks for joining us. Were you surprised by the very strong nature of these documents? IMRON COTAN, INDONESIAN AMBASSADOR TO AUSTRALIA: I’m not surprised at all. MARK DAVIS: Well, they’re a pretty damning indictment of the process that delivered West Papua to Indonesia. When you say you’re not surprised, was there no new information there for you? There was some new information there for the rest of us. IMRON COTAN: Well, there is no new information as far as the Indonesian Government is concerned. Why I said so, because we should not apply current standard of norms to judge the - you know, the past event. MARK DAVIS: This is hardly ancient history, sir. I mean, the Papuans have been saying this for many years, that they were delivered to Indonesia in a sham election. Now, when you read through the bulk of these documents, you would have to concur that the American Government at the time agreed with that position, although they never said so publicly.

IMRON COTAN: Well, I cannot and shall not concur to anything that is contrary to the Indonesian Government’s position. Let me educate you about the problems that we have in Papua. As you know, there is a well-established international law principle stating that the boundaries of a newly independent state conform to its pre-sovereign ones and… MARK DAVIS: See, that’s back in the ’50s, right, that’s back in the ’50s. Let’s settle with the 1969 election - the so-called Act of Free Choice, which has now come to attention again. The essential confirmation that these documents would suggest is that the people that were voting there were hand-selected, there was massive intimidation, civilians were killed, and the American Ambassador said that the vote was unfolding like a Greek tragedy, the conclusion was preordained - preordained by Suharto, of course. IMRON COTAN: Again, let me inform you - if you could kindly consult the book of history, the condition of the Papuans precluded them to exercise the principles that we are now holding in the very advanced democratic society like Australia. They could not even read or write properly. So that is why they elected their leaders to channel their aspirations. MARK DAVIS: Well, in recent weeks you’ve had 20 US senators writing to Kofi Annan urging that an envoy be appointed for West Papua and that a report be prepared. Again, is that of concern to you? IMRON COTAN: Well, we will not in any way or state let the senators of any particular country to rewrite our history. MARK DAVIS: Well, in recent days we’re getting unconfirmed reports of military raids across the highlands, again unconfirmed reports of arrests and some killings. Now, if this is going on, why shouldn’t there be impartial observers allowed in to monitor this? IMRON COTAN: Well, listen carefully - we should not and cannot speculate on unconfirmed reports that you are seeing. It is irresponsible. MARK DAVIS: OK, well some reports that were confirmed. Last year, late last year - again in the highlands - local leaders there, including OPM leaders, requested peace talks and for a cease-fire after confirmed reports of many hundreds of people being forced to hide in the bush and several people being murdered. The main person that made that call, Yustinus Murib, within weeks of writing to John Howard asking for assistance for talks from Australia or the UN, he was killed by Kopassus troops. Is that a reasonable response to a very tragic and deadly situation in West Papua? IMRON COTAN: Again I would like to underline the point that any responsible government should take stern actions against rebellions whenever it is occurring. So I think it is only responsible for my Government to take actions against those rebels. So if they are killed, indeed, that is, I believe, one of the consequences they have to face. MARK DAVIS: On the case concerning Yustinus Murib, who was killed last year in the highlands, did any Australian officials make inquiries of you about his fate? IMRON COTAN: Well, I should not disclose any relations that we have with Australia publicly. I believe we have our common concern. We discuss matters of common concern. But I think it is only responsible for me not to disclose any information relating to your government. MARK DAVIS: Imron Cotan, thanks again for joining us. IMRON COTAN: Thank you very much for having me. The Australian July 14, 2004 US ‘concern’ over West Papua Documents released by the US’ national security archive are expected to add fuel to legal claims by West Papua that its annexation was illegal. The 120 pages of documents, reported on by SBS Television’s Dateline program tonight, showed the 1969 Act of Free Choice vote was seriously flawed. The documents reported on the hand-selecting of local officials by the Indonesian government, massive intimidation and the killing of civilians, Dateline said. One US State Department report said the Indonesian government “has no intention of allowing West Irian to choose other than incorporation into Indonesia”. Another document written by State Department officials said: “Indonesia could not win an open election (in West Papua).” The documents are expected to boost the hopes of the Free West Papua Movement, OPM (Organisesi Papua Merdeka), which is seeking independence. Indonesian ambassador to Australia, Imron Cotan, told Dateline he was not surprised by the documents. “There is no new information as far as the Indonesian government is concerned,” Mr Cotan said. “We should not apply current standard of norms to judge the past events.” Mr Cotan said he stood by the Indonesian government’s action to quell the independence movement. “Any responsible government should take stern actions against rebellions wherever they occur,” he said. “It’s responsible for my government to take action against those rebels. “If they are killed, that is one of the consequences they have to face.” Mr Cotan also rejected a recent move by 20 US senators calling for the United Nations to appoint an envoy to inquire into the situation in West Papua. “We will not in any way or shape let the senators of any particular country to rewrite our history,” he said. SBS Dateline July 14, 2004 West Papua - Backgrounder, by Mark Davis And now to the Indonesian side of the island of New Guinea, West Papua. Both Australia and America have been courting the co-operation of Indonesia. Australia in particular has moved to renew training and intelligence links with some of the most notorious units of the Indonesian military. For its part, Indonesia has asked for more understanding in how it deals with its own security issues in rebellious provinces like West Papua. That understanding became a little more complicated this week with the release of some extraordinary documents from the US National Security Archive. Mark Davis will be speaking with the Indonesian Ambassador to Australia, but first a look at the documents and the issues. Reporter: Mark Davis: Since it took formal control of West Papua in 1969, Indonesia has faced consistent charges of severe human rights abuses there - abuses against tribal people in remote valleys far from the glare of media and international observers. Thousands of Papuans have been killed under Indonesian rule. For decades, the Papuan resistance movement, the OPM, seen here in footage smuggled to Dateline last year, have sought international recognition that Indonesia illegally seized their country through a sham election. News Report: The Act of Free Choice on whether or not West Irian was to remain in the Republic of Indonesia… They’ve long held that the 1969 Act of Free Choice was a rigged and illegitimate election, just over 1,000 hand-picked Papuans delivering a predetermined outcome. It now seems the US State Department essentially agreed with that view. This week, 120 pages of cables and memos were released from the US National Security Archive, which are potentially damaging to Indonesia’s legal claim to West Papua. Cable upon cable lists the concerns of US ambassadors and other staff about how the UN-monitored election was being conducted. Indonesia could not win an open election, they say, and they document the actions taken by the Indonesian military and senior government officials to secure the vote from a hand-selected few. “A Greek tragedy,” says the US Embassy, “where the conclusion is preordained.” For the West Papuans, these documents will add fuel to the legal claims they’re pursuing at the UN and around the world that their annexation by Indonesia was illegitimate, a message being heard with some sympathy in Europe, Ireland and the US.

As we showed last year, West Papuans were making a desperate call for international observers. From across the highlands came accounts of the Indonesian military burning villages to the ground and killing those they suspected of supporting the independence movement. This OPM rally called for a ceasefire in the highlands and pleaded with Australia or the UN to assist in peace negotiations. This commander, Yustinus Murib, wrote to John Howard, Kofi Annan and others asking for their diplomatic intervention. He was killed by Indonesian forces before he got a reply. — www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/index.html

The Jakarta Post Tuesday, July 13, 2004

RI repeats same old song on Papua

Kurniawan Hari, Jakarta In its response to new questions over the legitimacy of Indonesia’s sovereignty over Papua, it seems the government has learned little from the loss of East Timor in 1999. Members of the House of Representatives repeated on Monday the remarks of a foreign ministry official that Papua was an inseparable part of Indonesia and that the United Nations-sponsored referendum in the province in 1964 was final and no outside power could change it. “We will continue to take the UN endorsement (of the referendum) as our reference. If there is a declassified document stating otherwise, I think it is an internal problem of the U.S.,” said legislator Djoko Susilo, a member of House Commission I for foreign affairs. Djoko also questioned the motives behind the release of a declassified U.S. government document indicating that Washington in 1964 considered the referendum in Papua a sham, accusing the U.S. of trying to create instability in the country. He said the UN-sanctioned self-determination vote in Papua in 1964 was valid. “Why has the U.S. never questioned Israel’s presence in Palestine?” he asked. A newly declassified U.S. document shows that Washington dismissed the 1964 referendum, which involved tribal and community leaders handpicked by Jakarta, as a sham from the very beginning. Those Papuans allowed to take part in the referendum chose to join Indonesia, ending Dutch rule of the territory. “We should avoid the temptation to apply today’s standards to situations from the past. This most recent disclosure does not change our sovereignty over Papua,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Marty Natalegawa said on Sunday. Indonesia lost East Timor after occupying it for almost 22 years, mainly because it failed to win the hearts and minds of the people there. Although the UN never recognized Indonesia’s sovereignty over the territory, many observers believe East Timor would not have voted for independence if Jakarta had approached the East Timorese with a velvet glove instead of an iron fist. Similarly, separatist rumblings continue to grow in Papua in response to human rights abuses and the failure of Jakarta to give the province a larger share of the revenue from its natural resources. However, a legislator from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), R.K. embiring Meliala, said it was unreasonable for the U.S. government to release such a controversial document while still formally recognizing Indonesia’s sovereignty over Papua. Sembiring, who served as the chief of Papua’s Trikora Military Command from 1982 to 1985, also said: “The UN-sponsored vote took place fairly and democratically.” Separately, historian Asvi Warman Adam of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences said the declassified document could be used as an instrument to “rewrite” history without affecting Indonesia’s sovereignty over Papua. Indonesian scholars can use the declassified document as a source of information in their studies while still rejecting the substance of the document, he said. He said scholars should study why the U.S. dismissed the vote as a sham. The Jakarta Post Friday, July 16, 2004 Editorial: Spotlight on Papua The recent declassification of documents by the U.S. National Security Archive pertaining to the 1969 referendum on Papua has put this vast and resource-rich westernmost province of Indonesia in the spotlight. The 35-year-old documents say, in effect, that the UN-endorsed referendum was a sham as it excluded most Papuans during the so-called “Act of Free Choice”. In sum, the referendum was flawed. One of the documents was a 1969 report from the American Embassy in Jakarta to the U.S. Department of State, saying that the impending referendum unfolded like a Greek tragedy in which the conclusion was already preordained. Indonesia, it says “cannot and will not permit any resolution other than the continued inclusion of West Irian in Indonesia.” The documents referred to Papua, the western half of Papua New Guinea, as West Papua. Indonesia renamed the province Irian Jaya after the 1969 self-determination vote. Former president Abdurrahman Wahid changed IrianJaya back to Papua on Dec. 31, 1999. The Papuans voted unanimously to stay with Indonesia in the August 1969 referendum. The UN endorsed the referendum on Nov. 19 of the same yearthrough its resolution No.2504 in which 80 countries expressed their support and 30 countries abstained. It should be remembered that when Indonesia gained its independence in 1945, the country comprised more than 400 ethnic groups, encompassing stone-age to modern civilizations. Indonesian leaders believed that the most efficient way to hold the referendum was through the tribal chiefs. Even today the vast and rugged province, which is 10 times the size of the Netherlands, is still acutely underdeveloped. When the referendum was held some Papuan tribes still lived in stone-age societies. Language was a big barrier as Indonesian was new in the province and the tribes’ dialects were alien to Indonesian officials. Through the 1960s, the Cold War was in full swing. The U.S. considered it prudent to take sides with Soeharto, an emerging pro-Western army general in Indonesia, to stem the influence of communism in the largest Southeast Asian country. In July 1969, National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger, according to the document, told president Richard Nixon prior to his departure to Indonesia not to raise the issue of Papua with Soeharto. “You should tell Soeharto that we understand the problems they face in West Irian,” Kissinger was quoted as saying in one of the documents. Business interests danced to this tune. In fact the first foreign company to invest in Indonesia after the 1965 political earthquake that saw Sukarno tumbling from power was the U.S.-based Freeport McMoRan. Thirty years later, the company was sitting atop the biggest gold mine in the world, according to Australian scholar Denise Leith. We can say many things about the past, but nothing will change the fact that Papua was a legitimate part of Indonesia during those years. There is no way we can turn the clock of history back. The fact remains that the United Nations endorsed the referendum. Having said this, however, we believe that the government should address the issue of the flaws in the referendum by facing it head-on. It should talk to the Papuans about the issue. Secondly, the government should abandon its heavy-handed tactics in managing the province. Like people in other troubled regions of the country, the Papuans need no less than total sincerity from the government. A violent approach will never work. If the government promises something, it has to fulfill it. Nothing will shatter the common bond of trust faster than when the government says one thing at one time and another thing at another. When the government offers the province autonomy, it must make sure it honors this promise. On the international front, the government should anticipate a possible credo emerging from diverse sides on the need for Papuan independence. The government should prepare adequate diplomatic ammunition to defuse these factions before they become a movement too strong to resist. The way we look at it, something is brewing on the international front. In March this year, Irish parliamentarians urged UN Secretary General Kofi Annan to review the world body’s role in the 1969 referendum, joining South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu and scores of NGOs and European Parliamentarians. On June 28, 2004, nineteen U.S. Senators sent a letter to Annan urging the appointment of a Special Representative to Indonesia to monitor the human rights situation in Papua and Aceh. This is not to mention some groups in Australia that would like to see an independent Papua. The government has to work fast. It is simply too costly to sleep on the issue and to pretend that losing another province — after East Timor in 1999 — will not hurt the nation