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Why Should the Kingdom of Netherlands Responsible for West Papua?: An Answer from one of the victims?

Historical Accounts of Destruction on West Papua Land and People
If we look back at the history of West Papua, then we cannot make any mistake to conclude that the Dutch is responsible for the current unclear political status as well as sufferings of West Papua as a people, as a nation and as a land.

The history of colonialism in West Papua started since the early 1910, when Dutch Empire declared its official control over the western part of the island of New Guinea, at the same time when the British Empire declared the same thing over the eastern half of it. This colonial era started after Spanish traders visited the island in 1511, and the Columbus. Afterwards, two missionaries from Germany (Ottow and Geissler), who are now called the Papuan apostles, stepped their feet on the island and declared, "In the name of God, we step on this land." This happened on February, 1850.

In early 1960s or during the decolonisation period, British handed the eastern half to its "older colony" Australia but the Dutch did not want to lost its virgin land called Dutch New Guinea. One version says, instead of leaving the island, it recruited Papuan people to become politicians to help Dutch still in control over the island until today. Another version says that the Dutch was actually prepared its colony in West New Guinea to be a Free West Papua nation, but the process was late, and Indonesia conquered the island by military invasion.

Either the handing over of West Papua to Indonesia is a victory of Indonesia warfare against the Dutch or just a political incident faced by the Dutch during this decolonisation era, or as a deliberate attempt of the USA to destroy colonial power and establish its anti-Communist control and capitalist power over the Pacific is unclear. It needs further studies. The only thing Melanesians in West Papua know is that the Netherlands is historically responsible for the problems that have been occurring in West Papua since its withdrawal in 1960s. There are some reasons for this demand. First, Melanesians in West Papua believe that without the Dutch colonising them, Indonesia would never claim this land as its territory as well. Indonesia was declared as the previous Dutch colony, and this forced West Papua into Indonesia. The world approved Indonesia's invasion just because of the political and colonial map of the Dutch. Nothing else can be justifiable, except to say that previous Dutch colony is Indonesia. This is a process of re-colonisation of previous colony under neo-colonials power.

This world and this civilisation approved the recolonisation and neo-colonial power. The United States has been supporting Jakarta regime since Suharto's military coup in 1966 until now. Even though it has criticised over Indonesian brutality against civilians in East Timor and other outer islands, it has not yet and will never stop providing arms as well as intelligence and military training to Indonesia. Even though the British and French appear to be more democratic and show new moral values with their ethical foreign policies, they appear to tribal people in West Papua that they still want to sell arms to Indonesia and kill tribal people. Even though Germany will never admit its influence on the sufferings in West Papua, in fact its two Evangelists called "the Papuan Prophets" started calling themselves saviours for the people there and started all processes of colonisation, re-colonisation, exploration, exploitation and obliteration. At the moment, one of its multinational companies called Siemen as well as its embassy in Jakarta, in co-operation with the British and French Embassies, Germany is promoting the Mamberamo Dam Megaproject. This dam will relocate six tribes and transmigrate about 6,000 Javanese into the dam area. For the Dutch, current visit of the Foreign Minister of the Netherlands (Monday 17th) approves Melanesians' belief that the Dutch does not acknowledge its past historical mistake over the people of West Papua. Mr. Abdulrahman Wahid is also scheduled to travel to Europe in the near future to ask for support from European nations, to support genocidal and social engineering programmes as well as acts of murder carried out by the Indonesian government.

Legal Case
First of all, the legal case for the Dutch is the declaration of West Papua as its colony was illegal. It is illegal to say any island that the Dutch finds in the world automatically legally as its colony and under its control. This is legally unacceptable, but it already happened to West Papua. This is not only the case for West Papua, but for all other islands like Java, Sumatra, Borneo, Celebes, Molucas and others in Africa continent experienced the same illegal claim. Such a claim also made by other colonial powers like Britain, French, Spain and Portugal.

Secondly, the division of the island into East Papua and West Papua is an artificial boundary created by the ignorance and brutal-colonial behaviour of two European Empires: British and Dutch as they had been doing in other parts of the world like America and Africa. This kind of artificial boundary has caused so much brutalities in the whole world. If we learn abuses of human rights in the Middle East, Asia, Africa, America and in the Pacific, it is not difficult to say that colonial powers are responsible for all these. They are responsible because there are so many artificial boundaries that potentially vulnerable for colonisers to still influence their previous colonies and promote divisions, differences and warfare. In the case of West Papua, it is clear that the artificial boundary between Papua New Guinea has created so many problems. One example is that Melanesian people from West Papua who flee to PNG for because of being hunted by Indonesian government are forced to be send back by their own Melanesian brothers from PNG to their enemy Indonesia, who kill them everyday, just because their Melanesian brotherhood is artificially dismissed by modern nation-state boundary, created by the colonial powers. Another example is that last year, two respected members of the OPM were killed by their own brothers, PNG Police force. In is not far from possible to say that further clashes between Melanesians in PNG and West Papua is potentially being orchestrated by neo-colonial power of Indonesia. It is not untrue to conclude that both British and Dutch still retain political colonial power and influence in Indonesia and PNG that still cause problems within Melanesian brotherhood. All these started by artificial boundary of colonial power which was drawn illegally.

Further legal case for the Dutch to be responsible is the case of New York Agreement that it made with Indonesia, by ignoring the people of West Papua. The Netherlands regarded itself as the landlord of West Papua, and therefore it acted as the owner of West Papua land in the New York Agreement. It did not acknowledge that the people of West Papua have the right to be involved in the agreement. This New York Agreement made by Indonesia and the Dutch should implemented by West Papua people, without their approval. This furthermore shows how ignorant and illegal the Dutch government was.

Another legal case was the Act of Free Choice (PEPERA) which was conducted under the control of the Dutch. The Dutch was aware that the PEPERA was carried out only by 1,025 people out of 800,000 and that the principle of One "Man One Vote" was not respected, but Dutch government did not say anything about it. Even though Melanesian people and Dr. Ortis Sanz, the UN representative to West Papua expressed their concern on the PEPERA, but the Dutch appeared "washed their hands" from the issue of West Papua.

Not only that, in 1995-1996, when two of its citizens were kidnapped by Kelly Kwalik, one of the OPM Commanders in the Southern Highlands, the Dutch government was involved in giving advice and military training to release the hostages. In this release, at least 16 civilians were killed by "white soldiers in white helicopter" but this issue has been ignored by the Dutch. Even though it is morally and historically responsible, the Dutch has chosen not to say or do anything about it.

Political Case
Only when the West Papua organisation in Holland called Papua People's Front (PaVo) challenged the Dutch government in the late 1999 that its foreign minister admitted, "The issue of West Papua is an unfinished business." This indicated to the people of West Papua that the Dutch agrees the illegality of West Papua land and people into Indonesia. It shows that there are some things that need to be sort out, particularly in relation to ongoing brutality by the Indonesian government. The last murder, December 2nd, 1999, where three civilians were killed in Timika, when the people were having a peaceful gathering indicated that Abdulrahman Wahid is not a spiritual leader anymore, but he is now a politician. It also showed that Megawati Sukarnoputri is really the daughter of her father who invaded West Papua in 1962 and killed tens of thousands of Melanesian people. If the Dutch foreign minister says the case is unfinished, then it needs finishing.

Therefore, from this time onward, the people of West Papua are now holding to the government of Netherlands's word. The people are demanding to "finish" the "unfinished business" in this 21st century, in this era where there is no colonialism allowed in the world anymore, in the time when there is no threat of communism and cold-war, in the era of new world order, in the era of more civilised humanity in the whole planet.

Final Remark
If the Dutch Foreign Minister says, "it is an unfinished business", then it is not untrue for the  Alliance of Students of West Papua to demand the Dutch to take a clear step towards solution of ongoing problems in West Papua. It is not wrong for this organisation of young generations to demand further steps to be taken to explain what actually happened during the handing over of their land to Indonesia, which consequently has caused so much abuse of human rights and exploitation of natural resources. It is not illegal if the young generations would like to re-examine and correct their own history as human being with their full rights that should be respected and not to be manipulated by colonial and neo-colonial powers.

The Students are now asking the International Community to support their demand to hold International Seminars on legal, political and historical issues related to West Papua People and the Land within Indonesia as the neo-colonial regime.