Thanks to the courage of eyewitness and a few intrepid investigative Journalists, these stories are not new, nor disbelieved.

Sadly the folks empowered to do something, anything, about these travesties, remain silent or indeed it would seem, complicit?

With trade deals and the mighty dollar shamefully taking first place.

Were this not so, this slow rolling massacre and abuse of the most basic of human rights,wouldn't be allowed to happen? Or the perpetrators held to account?
The case of rape as a weapon ought to result in the criminals being castrated as the only real justice?

And as evidenced in East Timor the perpetrators have form on the board, always providing the nation is small, friendless, and all but indefensible By the local population? with tanks, gunships and machine guns against primitive bows and arrows.

We've all seen some of the smuggled out video footage

I sincerely wish it could be otherwise!
Rhrosty.

A compelling article and inditement of the Indonesian Government.

Three problems:

1. Ethnic "mainly Javanese?" Indonesians might now make-up the majority of people in West Papua/Irian. Such transmigration is an intentional Indonesian policy. So West Papuan causes are becoming marginalised in that sense.

2. In terms of formally testifying the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Netherlands may be the logical venue and process to hear West Papuan evidence. BUT the legacy of Dutch atrocities during the Dutch colonial period in broader Indonesia and West Papua may make the ICC mysteriously reluctant to hear about Indonesian atrocities toward West Papuans.

The righteous Dutch dominated ICC may not want to risk dredging up past Dutch atrocities (including in the 1945-49 Indonesian Independence conflict). The Dutch tactic of cutting off a limb of one person per hut in Javanese villages (1945-49) etc.

The UN may be a better place.

3. Is West Papuan Independence a lost cause? What moral or international political help has PNG given? Would Australia want an independent West Papua to be a East Timor-like needy case (but on a larger scale?).

The appea$ers in Australia will continue to turn a blind eye toward$ the plight of the$e people.
Australia i$ not intere$ted in $aving the$e unfortunate$.

One wonder$ why?

Black people have never been able to create functioning, modern societies. My own personal explanation for this is that as a race, their intelligence levels are too low. That does not mean that there are no smart blacks, but they are too few in number, and intelligent blacks not posses the same moral principles which advanced western societies possess. Blacks are much better off being colonies of more advanced civilisations. West New Guinea is no exception. The only fly in the ointment is that they are the colony of a Muslim nation, but even backward Islam is preferable to outright barbarism.

The interesting thing about the critics of colonialism is that Indonesia was once one of them. But given the opportunity, colonialism denouncers like Indonesia don't mind indulging in a little colonialism themselves when they get the opportunity. This has been of great benefit to Australia. PNG has become a serious pain in the ass to Australia. It sucks up $500 million dollars in Aussie aid every year, and that is going to last into perpetuity. We can no longer afford to keep these people and their endless problems any more. It would be better for Australia to give permission to Indonesia to take over PNG.

This would have great benefit to the people of PNG who would like PNG to become prosperous, instead of the totally dysfunctional and corruption riddled society it has become. The Indonesians would enforce the law and would not tolerate the "rascal" activity which now makes the towns and cities of PNG into such dangerous places.

PNG is a rich country and it only takes a civilisation with some brains to make it into a profitable colony. While ever the black people rule themselves, most of the money, (and most of the aid money from Australia) is going to go into the pockets of the tribal rulers. The people in west New Guinea moaning about independence are just the Idi Amins, Julius Nyerere's and ATSIC's who only dream of becoming WNG's rulers so that they can become top dogs and plunder the place themselves.

I blame the British Empire.

G'day LEGO

You're so racist but so accurate.

Someone I know well was involved in organising highly technical international conferences some years back.

Numerous delegates from black Africa attended a particular conference. While the subject matter was beyond these African chaps, they had been flown in to stack the voting as ordered by a certain European country.

But these African delegates got bored. One of them spotted a particularly luscious blond Australian women working for the conference. On further inspecting her a couple of the African delegates formulated a plan.

They approached the Head Organiser of the conference (an Aussie bloke) and reasoned that his authority over the staff extended to renting them out for extra service. So they asked him quietly - the immortal question "How much for the Blond?"

This was also a conference at which a certain black American delegate (a senior political official) spent his time chasing two other Aussie brunettes around the conference secretariat room, a room even powerful black American delegates were not ment to be.

Goes to show the lusty need for white woman goes across color lines and can get messy.

Bloody hell!
What a charming lot the human race are.

Yes, the black cultures do show themselves to be more ignorant
And less capable of civilised behaviour, and the just,economic,running of countries.
We've been throwing aid money at them for decades, yet they seem incapable
Of building even a ruddy decent water pipeline and so people must drink dirty
Disease riddled water.

West Papua, is a prime example of what happens when you can't defend yourself and your country. Forget this brotherhood of man rubbish, and love and peace brother talk.
Those things don't exist in any real way.

Better to be Capitalist and honestly making a Quid to live with than a Socialist and covertly chasing power so you can take what yothers live with.

If any want to understand the sad history of UN sanctioned travesty of 'Indonesian colonisation' refer to:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/29/west-papua-independence-history

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-07-16/five-key-things-to-know-about-west-papua/6625096

[extract:] In October 2011, the Third Papuan People's Congress, a civilian gathering that addressed issues of self-governance, was violently quashed by Indonesian forces. Six people were killed and dozens more injured.
Indonesia guards its "territorial integrity" jealously. And it's no surprise – the massive Freeport McMoran gold and copper mine in West Papua is one of the country's largest taxpayers. [mine has produced US$40 billion]
For its part, Indonesia argues that since West Papua was once a part of the Dutch East Indies, it should also be part of today's independent Indonesian Republic.
Both major Australian political parties support them in this stance.
Indonesia is seen as an important political ally for Australia, and politicians from both sides are loath to antagonise their Indonesian counterparts. Australia maintains close ties with the Indonesian military. It also provides training and funding for its counter-terror police unit, Detachment 88, which has been involved in recent crackdowns on the independence movement.

So do we send over a few platoons of SAS to wipe out the rebel terrorists? - at least that would be consistent . . . $$$$

It is vile what has happened and continues to happen in West Papua; as vile, cruel, callous and horrible as what every colonising nation has done to indigenous people. What the English did to the Maoris, to the Australian Aborigines, to the natives of every African country, to North American Indians, to Malays, to Burmese is sickening and vile beyond belief. What the Anglo American coalition has been doing and continues to do in the Middle East is as vile.
It’s the result of civilization. All those countries were inhabited by independent, self-reliant people living sustainably in loose groups for two hundred thousand years. Then civilization arose in the ‘West’, making people reliant on others, and that requires money, the lust for which is the cause of looting and killing those who get in your way.
We want the gold in Irian Jaya, so we’ll kill the buggers who try to stop us. It’s simple. It’s human. It’s civilized.
In my opinion Lego and other ignorant racists, independent, self-sufficient men who provide for themselves without destroying their environment, are worth a million times more than civilized gangs who rape, loot, main and kill to get what they want

Ygbirp
You'll find it is not just Western civilisation that has a bloody history
Most countries have them.

The Ottoman Empire occupied a lot of the Middle East through
Murderous conquest, before the British.
The Ottoman Empire was Muslim.

They slaughtered and raped the Christians living in Damascus, and Aleppo.
Probably the war happening there at the moment with the tribe around
Assad, and the Rebels goes back to those hostilities.

One Rwandan tribe absolutely slaughtered the other. Again, nothing to do
With Europe or the West.

The Japanese killed millions when they invaded China in the years leading up
To the 2nd world war.

When Mugabee and a general who assisted him kicked out the British, they set out
Ethnically cleansing anther tribe there. The general said, "why are we doing this."
I thought only the British did this."

I watched a documentary in Africa a few months ago, and it was stated that 1 in 5
African men admit to raping women.
It is a male problem, not a British one.

The Muslims rape every woman in sight whenever they take a village or city
In a war.

How come all the people from these countries a voting with their hearts
And minds to get into Europe, if it's such a worse place to live in
Then the ones they live in.

It's telling that Isis has to forcibly stop people from leaving, whereas Europe has to put up fences to stop them trying to get in.

Cherful, I deliberately wrote, All colonising nations. That included Indonesia in this case, and ALL countries that want to take over others for whatever reason. As for your comment that "The Muslims rape every woman in sight whenever they take a village or city
In a war." I assume you don't mean 'all'... but Australians and Americans, and British have been known to be no better, we only hear about the enemy.
As for: "How come all the people from these countries a voting with their hearts
And minds to get into Europe, if it's such a worse place to live in
Then the ones they live in"
You are off the point. Europeans got rid of the Ottomans, then colonised the Middle East with slaughter as great as that committed by the Ottomans, drew lines across the desert, installed puppet dictators and stirred up so many problems that the current crisis was inevitable. The refugees are seeking shelter in the lands that helped to create the mess. It's no less than the arrogant Europeans deserve. the refugees aren't colonising - yet...:)

Australia carries some shame with regard to West Papua.
We had the opportunity to press for the UN to unite it with
Papua New Guinea or to be independent but Gough Whitlam opted to hand it to Indonesia.
There was a lot of sympathy in Australia for them to be joined to PNG
or independence but the Labour party was concerned with upsetting the Indonesians.

Indonesia's takeover of West Papua was in 1962 - very bloody.

Nothing to do with Indonesia's takeover of East Timor (1975) or PNG Independence (1975).

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands_New_Guinea#1957-1961 onwards.

Should Australia have sided with Holland's Army in Dutch New Guinea (later West Papua) in 1962? A long war in Dutch New Guinea may have lasted years!

Much left anti-colonialism and the very active non-aligned movement were actually led by such forces as Sukarno and the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in the 1950s and 60s...Different times. It would have been Australia with Holland against such ideological and military forces in 1962!