The Outrigger  is the newsletter of the Pacific Islands Society, normally distributed to members three times a year. It includes news of the Pacific and of PISUKI and other Pacific-related events in the UK and Ireland.

From Issue 52, Spring 2008

Lords Papua plea

THE Government was urged in a Lords debate in February to step up efforts to persuade Indonesia to put an end to the abuse of human rights and torture of political detainees in West Papua.

THE proportion of indigenous Melanesians in West Papua is expected to drop from 96 per cent of a 900,000 population in 1971 to around 15 per cent by 2030, the House of Lords was told in a recent debate.

“Papuans are becoming a minority in their own country”, said the Rt Rev Lord Harries, the former Bishop of Oxford, quoting a UN source as describing West Papua as being among those countries whose population were “at risk of extinction”.

Leading the debate on Feb 26, he said that human rights abuses in West Papua were “very grave”. The systematic brutality was in support of the 1969 “act of no choice” when a handpicked 1,000 Papuans voted under military pressure to remain part of Indonesia instead of seeking independence.

He wanted the Government to work for an international presence in West Papua to ensure that those who are raising human rights issues could do so “without the present fear of intimidation, torture and death”.

Speakers referred to international reports alleging brutality by army, police and paramilitary units in stamping out peaceful protests, and the widespread use of torture of detainees, and extra-judicial executions.

Lord Archer of Sandwell said that history would not understand how human suffering on such a scale continued year after year while the world looked on complacently. He urged the Government to go to the Security Council.

Baroness Cox said that the conflict was primarily a struggle for West Papuan independence or self- determination.

The Lib-Dem spokesman, Lord Avebury, who is a former president of TAPOL, the Indonesian human rights campaign, asked for pressure to be applied to Indonesia to train the judiciary and police, and Lord Astor (Cons) wanted the Government to get Indonesia to try to achieve a basic standard of human rights.

“Torture is a central pillar of West Papua rule,” he said.

For the Government, Lord Malloch-Brown acknowledged that Lord Harries had raised issues that were not acceptable anywhere.

But Indonesia was a country that had changed enormously in the past decade, including making significant improvements in human rights.

Britain recognised the shortcomings of Indonesia but “we believe that the way forward is an internal dialogue between the people of Papua and the Government of Jakarta”, he said.

Solomons can have a bright future, Says MP

 AFTER a visit to the Solomons, Michael Howard MP, former leader of the Conservative Party, said the Island state had
“enormous potential” and, given the right political and physical infrastructure, could develop into a unique tourist destination.

“Apart from the usual attributes of South Pacific Islands, the country has an extraordinary legacy of the Second World War in terms of underwater wrecks and islands on which President John F Kennedy was shipwrecked and from which he was rescued during that conflict,” he told The Outrigger.

Mr Howard went to the Solomons with Baroness Golding, the Labour peer, when he led a British parliamentary delegation to the South Pacific last year. The delegates spent a week in New Zealand before splitting up into small groups to see the Islands - Elliot Morley (Labour MP for Scunthorpe) and Andrew Tyrie (Conservative, Chichester) went to the Cook Islands; and David Crausby (Labour, BoltonNorth East) and Lindsay Hoyle (Labour, Chorley) to Samoa.

The visit, arranged by the UK branch of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, was to discuss climate change, subsidy-free agriculture in New Zealand, governance matters, the role of the CPA and, in the Solomons, development funding.

Mr Howard and Baroness Golding also saw for themselves the tsunami-struck areas around Gizo, where 52 people died after an underwater earthquake, measuring 8.0 on the Richter scale, unleashed a l6ft wall of water through the western Solomons. More than 36,000 people and 6,300 homes were affected.

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During the CPA’s visit to Gizo, Mr Richard Lyne, the British high commissioner, and Mr Howard handed over 60 sewing machines to women survivors in the emergency tented camp to provide them with income for their families.
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All elements of the visit were a great success. In all the countries the delegates enjoyed excellent access to parliamentarians and ministers.

In New Zealand, much time was spent on climate change.

The MPs agreed that the mission, particularly to the Islands, was of much value. It gave them a big insight into the challenges faced by the small Island nations.

In the Cook Islands, behind the outward façade of a South Pacific paradise, there were major infrastructure challenges regarding potable water supply, drainage, sewage and waste disposal and in Samoa, there was much interest in climate change issues.

In Honiara, governance issues were discussed together with the tsunami relief funds from the UK, which at the time of the delegation’s visit, had not been disbursed some months after the April disaster. Delegation members were disappointed that reconstruction work still needed to be done on Gizo.

Britain donated SI$250,000 (about £18,000) to the disaster fund. In addition, Britain helped bilaterally with small recovery projects in Gizo, Vella Lavella and South New Georgia as well as funding repairs to a crucial wharf at Nusatupe airfield in Gizo.

The British Government also helped to ensure the EU provided 550,000 Euros (about £380,000) from ECHO, its humanitarian arm. ECHO’s work is largely focussed on water and sanitation work as well as child welfare through the French Red Cross and the UK Save The Children Fund, which is represented on the ground by the Australian branch.