Dr Bruce Flegg
Member for Moggill

Amnesty Motion

Friday, 02 December 2011 10:16

Parliamentary Amnesty Group 

Motion 

That the Parliament of Queensland:

1 joins with Amnesty International in calling for the Indonesian Government to act immediately on allegations of humanrights abuse at the Third Papuan Peoples’ Congress on 19 October 2011;

2 notes that an investigation by the Indonesian National Human Rights Commission found that Indonesian security forcesopened fire on participants at the peaceful gathering, as well as beating and kicking them;

3 calls for the protection of human rights in Papua, and, in particular, that the Indonesian Government respect Papuans’rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association;

4 notes that the Indonesian President’s office has rejected the findings of the Commission, along with recommendationsthat the Indonesian National Police Chief investigate the matter.

5 with Amnesty International, urges the Indonesian authorities to initiate an independent, thorough and effectiveinvestigation into the Commission’s findings; and6 if the investigations find that security forces committed unlawful killings, torture or other ill-treatment, then calls for thoseresponsible, including persons with command responsibility to be prosecuted in proceedings that meet internationalstandards of fairness, and victims provided with reparations. 

Dr FLEGG (Moggill—LNP) (6.15 pm): I have great pleasure in seconding the motion moved by the Leader of the House. Indonesia is of course our nearest populous neighbour and the world’s largest Muslim nation. There are many things that we need to appreciate from Indonesia, which has great difficulty with a very diverse country and which has done a lot of good work in the area of fighting terrorism, on cooperating with Australia on people smuggling and on building one of the most functional democracies among emerging countries with a high level of press freedom. We should not underestimate the difficulty of doing that in a country like Indonesia.

But, sadly, there is a black spot on Indonesia’s record on human rights and that is in the area of Irian Jaya or Papua, a nation of over two million people. It is a nation that really has very little in the way of human rights. When they voted to join Indonesia, in a country of over two million people only around a thousand people were able to record a vote. The problems there relate particularly to militarisation, with a large Indonesian army presence. As a result, they have become isolated from the rest of the world as a matter of Indonesian government policy. International journalists are either prohibited or very severely restricted, and there has been considerable oppression against organisations that try to promote human rights. 

This came to a head with the murder of prominent journalist Adriansyah Matra’is, who was a very prominent journalist on state television and on a number of different channels in Indonesia. After recording illegal logging being done by a company associated with senior military officers, he was found murdered, floating in a river in Papua. There are many political prisoners in the country who are arrested under laws relating to subversion and incitement but who more often than not are just peaceful protesters. Murder and torture have been widely reported. There is an area in Mercure Regency of Papua Province where 1.2 million hectares of land that belongs to traditional owners in that country has been alienated for commercial development and largely for cash crops such as palm oil rather than food crops that the often subsistence population requires.There is extensive violation of Indigenous land rights in this area as the Indonesian government— frequently corporations associated with high officials—tries to exploit the province’s mineral wealth.Those land rights are particularly vital in a society where life is still very traditional, very subsistence andvery village based. As usual when we see this secrecy and violation of human rights, it is often the weakest people who suffer the most, and that is frequently women. There are many reports of atrocity and maltreatment of women. There is now large-scale migration from other parts of Indonesia into the mineral rich province. 

In 1969 the alleged act of free choice—which I referred to earlier where only a thousand peopleout of a nation of two million were able to record a vote—is still considered to be a valid vote by the Indonesians.

Dr FLEGG: Yes, I take that interjection. What those who are concerned for human rights want to see happen is that, firstly, the Indonesian government needs to acknowledge and accept that it has violated the human rights of people in the West Irian area. It needs to immediately move to lift the curtain of secrecy that surrounds journalism and access in that country and restore openness to it. It needs to permit a United Nations presence to observe some of the military activity that occurs there. It certainly needs to allow much greater freedom  for international military. 

It needs to decrease the military presence in a country where mostly poor civilians do not present a large military threat to justify the force that is there presently. It needs in particular to respect and acknowledge Indigenous land tenure issues that are so vital for those people. This is a nation that is very close to us. In many ways, they are a friend of Australia and I think it is right and proper that the Queensland parliament and Australia as a whole should be urging them to improve their human rights record in this area. It is a black spot on them. 

Finally, I would like to pay tribute to those from Amnesty and the other human rights advocates who frequently risk their own lives in operating in areas like Papua in order to try to protect the rights of others. We are all relatively safe and comfortable in this country, but it is certainly not the case if you are a human rights advocate in Papua. I take my hat off to those people and acknowledge the work that they do at their own risk.