Stunning about faces by NZ and PNG over West Papua human rights

PNG Prime Minister Peter O'Neill's EM TV interview on West Papua.

NEW ZEALAND’S public pension fund has stunned the human rights fraternity monitoring the recent upsurge in West Papua violations by Indonesian security forces in West Papua by pulling out more than $1 million in investment from the US-based copper and gold mining giant Freeport-McMoRan.

The $15.7 billion NZ Superannuation Fund announced it was ending investment in four companies that were violating international ethics standards.

The fund decided to can its Freeport investment in the wake of persistent allegations of human rights offences committed by security forces around the company’s controversial Grasberg mine.

But the Auckland-based Indonesia Human Rights Committee and a young photojournalist affiliated with the Pacific Media Centre can take a bow for their contribution to the change of heart by the super fund.

The IHRC has been an ardent campaigner against the investment while Karen Abplanalp, then a postgraduate student at AUT University, carried out a major investigation of the mine and the New Zealand connection as part of her Asia-Pacific Journalism coursework.

Her article was worked up into the lead investigative article, entitled "Blood Money", in Metro magazine in its December edition. This gave a major public profile to an issue that had previously been “hidden”.

If that wasn’t a big enough setback for the Indonesians in the global credibility stakes over its failed West Papua policies, Papua New Guinean Prime Minister Peter O’Neill declared that he was going on the front foot by applying diplomatic pressure on the Indonesians over the human rights violations against their Melanesian brothers.

This is an extraordinary, but welcome, step for a PNG leader to take – and the first such move by a prime minister since independence in 1975. Here is Karen’s Pacific Scoop report on the investment fund fallout:

NZ Superfund stand against Freeport mine ‘rights breaches’ stirs headlines

By Karen Abplanalp

New Zealand’s public pension Superfund stand against alleged Indonesian government security forces breaches of human rights is making a mark around the world.

The story has been covered by international media and hit the front page of Indonesian news website the Jakarta Globe, with the headline New Zealand fund pulls Freeport investment, cites Papua rights offences.

It is the first time a government fund has made statements linking Indonesian security forces, corruption and human rights abuses.

The NZ Superfund (NZSF) and its investment in the US-owned mining giant Freeport McMoRan’s Grasberg mine were the subject of a major Metro investigation last December written by me while I was a postgraduate communication studies  student at AUT University.

At the time, the fund was adamant that it would not divest from Freeport and that the mining company was meeting the fund’s responsible investment standards.

What has changed then for NZSF since the Metro investigation?

NZSF’s head of responsible investing Anne-Maree O’Connor replied to Pacific Scoop:  “We have had more time to continue our engagement with a number of companies on our portfolio and to review the resources we have to commit to engagement, and look through which companies we would likely have success with engagement, which ones we needed to draw a line with that we should not pursue engagement because we did not feel that would could generate enough change given our resources and our holdings in the company."

Human rights breached
The NZSF statement said: “Freeport-McMoRan has been excluded based on breaches of human rights standards by security forces around the Grasberg mine, and concerns over requirements for direct payments to government security forces by the company in at least two countries in which it operates.

“Despite improvements in Freeport-McMoRan’s own human rights policies, breaches of standards by government security forces are beyond the company’s control. This limits the effectiveness of further engagement with the company.”

NZSF has investments with RioTinto, which owns 40 percent of Freeport McMoRan – does this mean that NZSF will divest from Rio Tinto also?

O’Connor said: “Freeport McMoRan is the operator mine and they are the ones who make the payments to (the military) and are responsible on the security issues.” 

“…  It is a significant stake, 40 percent, but Freeport McMoRan is the company that is operating the mine, and they are the ones that need to make management policy decisions.”

It will be interesting to see if  other crown financial institutes follow suit.

The Government Pension Fund and the Earthquake Commission also have investments in Freeport McMoRan.

IHRC thanks fund
The Auckland-based Indonesian Human Rights Committee (IHRC), which has long campaigned against “unethical” investment in the mine, met with the NZSF to thank the fund for its decision to divest from Freeport McMoRan.

IHRC chair Maire Leadbeater said the meeting went “extremely well”.

“We were met by CEO Adrian Orr and by Anne-Maree O’Connor and were shown to a room of about 40 people, all of their staff.”

Leadbeater told the staff they were really pleased about the decision, and told them about the kind of response they were getting from around the world.

Indonesia and Timor-Leste campaigner Josef Benedict from Amnesty International said the agency continued to receive “credible reports” of human rights violations committed by the security forces  in the neigbouring provinces of Papua and West Papua.

The reports included allegations of torture and other ill-treatment, unnecessary and excessive use of force and firearms and possible unlawful killings.

“Investigations into reports of police abuses are rare and only a few perpetrators have been brought to justice,” he said.

“Amnesty International is also concerned that international observers, non-governmental organisations and journalists continue to be to be denied unrestricted access to the two provinces.”

Amnesty International believes that the lack of independent and impartial monitoring of human rights in the West Papua region contributes to a “climate of impunity”.

Freeport-McMoRan responds
In a response statement to Pacific Scoop, Freeport-McMoRan made the same assertions that the NZSF had made to the original Metro investigation but were discredited in that report.

“We are disappointed in the New Zealand Superannuation Fund’s decision to exclude Freeport-McMoRan from its portfolio based on claims of breaches of human rights abuses by PT Freeport Indonesia (PTFI), a Freeport-McMoRan subsidiary,” said Eric Kinneberg, the company’s external communications director.

“As specifically recognised by the fund, PTFI has improved its human rights policies and procedures.”

The statement said Freeport-McMoRan had cooperated with the Indonesian government in its role of maintaining public order, upholding the rule of law, and protecting company personnel and property.

“The police are assigned via a presidential decree to protect the Grasberg mine site, which has been categorised as a national vital asset,” Kinneberg said.

“Where invited by the police, the Indonesian military also may be deployed to provide additional security.”

Karen Abplanalp is an Auckland photographer, writer and contributor to Pacific Scoop.

• Earlier story about Karen Abplanalp’s Metro report
• Blood Money – the Metro investigation
• PNG on Indonesian human rights violations in Papua

Pacific Islands Forum shuns West Papuan issue

Photo: Del Abcede / PMC

THE MOST astonishing unreported story in this week’s Pacific Island Forum in Auckland was a remarkable shift by the United Nations chief over West Papua. And the local media barely noticed. For all the hoo-ha about “converting potential into opportunity” at the predictable annual political talkfest, this was the most dramatic moment.

It was thanks to the probing of a young Papua New Guinean journalist studying in New Zealand who knew the right question to ask. But the significance was lost on local journalists – and even the Pacific and international journalists present. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon suggested that the West Papuan issue should be discussed by the Decolonisation Committee of the United Nations General Assembly.

What? Coming in the wake of the Indonesian repression in West Papua throughout August in the face of a wave of unrest by Papuans more determined than ever for self-determination, this was almost unbelievable.

Question: [unclear] With regards to human rights - for more than 42 years, there’s a struggle in West Papua as people seeking their [own] government in the province of West Papua.

What is the United Nations stand on that?

BKM: This issue should also be discussed at the Decolonisation Committee of the United Nations General Assembly. And when it comes again, whether you are an independent state or a non-self-governing territory or whatever, the human rights is inalienable and a fundamental principle of the United Nations.

We will do all to ensure that people in West Papua, their human rights will be respected.

Question: Does a human rights fact-finding mission has be dispatched to West Papua at some time?

BKM: That is the same answer [to a previous question on Fiji] that should be discussed at the Human Rights Council amongst the member states.
Normally the Secretary General acts on the basis of a mandate given by inter-governmental bodies.

Because journalist Henry Yamo’s question was overshadowed by queries about Fiji, it probably slipped below the media radar. Was it a slip-up that officials were keen to brush aside? However, NGOs such as the Auckland-based Indonesia Human Rights Committee were quick to seize on the moment. Overnight a media declaration was produced by 15 Australian and NZ NGO signatories with the help of four West Papuans being hosted on the AUT University marae.

They called for the UN Secretary-General to:

• appoint a Special Representative to investigate the situation in West Papua – to review the circumstances and outcome of the 1969 ‘Act of Free Choice’, as well as the contemporary situation; and
  
  
• use his good offices to persuade the Indonesian government to allow free access to West Papua for media representatives from the international community and for non-governmental human rights organisations.

The statement also called on the Pacific Islands Forum to:

• send a fact-finding mission to West Papua to investigate the human rights situation;
  
  
• support the West Papuan people in their call for peaceful dialogue with the Indonesian government;
  
  
• grant observer status to West Papuan representatives who support the people of West Papua’s right of self-determination; and
  
  
• recommend to the United Nations General Assembly that West Papua be put back on the agenda of the Decolonisation Committee.

But the Forum simply ignored the West Papua issue.

In spite of a West Papuan protest outside the Forum opening and later at the summit hotel, the local media were only interested in a parallel protest against the Fiji military regime and the Forum communiqué failed to mention West Papua. Hypocrisy. While the Forum has already welcomed New Caledonia and French Polynesia as associate member status, and Timor-Leste (another former Indonesian former colonial possession) as an observer and is now granting American Samoa the same privileges, it remains silent about the atrocities and human rights violations in a Melanesian territory of the Pacific.

At the West Papuan protest, Green MP Catherine Delahunty grabbed a protest placard and tried to attract the interest of Pacific delegates in the plight of the Papuans. A gagged young man who was symbolically “locked up” in a bamboo cage, also had a story to tell. He was Amatus Douw, one of 43 Papuan political asylum seekers who fled to Australian in 2006. The other marae-based activists were Dr John Ondawame (West Papua People’s Representative Office in Vanuatu); Rex Rumakiek (secretary-general of the West Papua National Coalition for Liberation - WPCNL); and Paula Makabory ( Institute of Papuan Advocacy and Human Rights – IPAHR).

The absence of West Papua from the final communiqué was not the only blot on the Forum’s outcomes. While New Zealand was busy talking up the success of the Forum – “[Murray] McCully scores with his A-list forum”, as the New Zealand Herald billed it – most social justice and human rights issues were sidelined. There were structural problems too.

Violence against women
Although the issue of Sexual and gender-based violence against women was cited in the communiqué again this year, it was remarkable that media took little notice. Amnesty International collected a petition of 21,000 signatures and to his credit, President Anote Tong, accepted this while no other Pacific leader did.

But the media took even less interest, apart from reports by the student journalist team from Pacific Scoop. Jocelyn Lai of the Young Women’s Christian Association spoke harrowing tales and provided case studies of violence against women and girls in the Solomon Islands, a culture of silence and impunity because of the stigma. A report about Solomon Islands slums denied sanitation and safety was devastating, yet no SI journalist turned up for this let alone any other Forum journalists. Two thirds of women and girls aged between 15 and 49 had experienced physical or sexual violence from their partners and other family members.

In fact, the Forum’s engagement with civil society was dismal. While Pacific leaders recognised in the communiqué many of the issues identified by civil society were ones already on the regional agenda. There is still much rhetoric and not enough action. Female representation, or rather lack of it, is nothing short of “scandalous”. Move over Gulf Arab states, the Pacific is far worse. Six out of the world’s 10 countries without female representation are in the Pacific.

Little will change politically in the Pacific region without more women and greater diversity in the parliamentary representation. Yet women’s and other civil society groups were largely marginalised, if not actually excluded, by the Forum establishment elite. Next year in the Cook Islands an actual “dialogue” is needed between the region’s political leaders and the NGOs.

Think tank excluded
An independent think tank, the Pacific Policy Institute based in Vanuatu, was actually excluded from the Forum. While the conservative Australian-based Lowy Institute enjoyed a privileged position, including having a day-long conference in an Auckland hotel just two days before the Forum opened and had the opportunity to launch a controversial Fiji opinion poll, its opposite number – a real Pacific think tank, was being denied any accreditation.

It is believed that this is because of its policy on Fiji where it seeks “positive engagement”.

The Forum wasn’t all negative by any means. It certainly put the “Pacific” of Aotearoa on a world map with the presence of UN and European Union at the top level – plus the largest Chinese and US delegations - in a manner that has never been achieved previously in four decades of leader summits. The opening Pacific Showcase at the Cloud on Queens Wharf is a drawcard. And NZ Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully can take the credit for this.

Also some NGOs welcomed the “responsiveness” of Forum leaders to climate change needs, civil society involvement in the future and the UN Arms Trade Treaty. Trade still remains a problem – it has been a very thorny issue in the past – and while Fiji will now be allowed back into the Pacer Plus (a pragmatic decisions based on necessity rather than any “softening up” of policies by Australia and NZ), negotiations are still likely to be delicate. Fiji has achieved some diplomatic successes in recent months and may force Australia and New Zealand to take a more pragmatic line rather than leaving a regional political void to China.

• 'Popular dictator' poll severe blow to regime critics
• Special investigation into state repression in West Papua
• 42nd Pacific Islands Forum communiqué
• Pacific Scoop coverage of the 42nd Forum
  

Farewell Ka Bel - a hero of the working class

"HE HAD wanted to die 'in the streets', says the Philippine Daily Inquirer, "that is, in the act of principled protest, deep in the trenches of a never-ending war against injustice. Instead, progressive Congressman Crispin "Ka Bel" Beltran died after falling off the roof of his modest, mortgaged house, in the act of tending to his family's needs. He was trying to fix the roof before the rains fell." It was a shock when his death came to the many activists, civil society advocates, democrats and journalists in the Philippines, New Zealand and the world who were inspired by his life of integrity.

The Inquirer added:
It may not have been a hero's death, but it was still a virtuous one, with a timeless lesson in personal integrity. It showed an astonished nation that it is possible to remain poor while serving in Congress, despite the trappings, the generous staffing budgets, the access to pork barrel funds. Despite all that, the 75-year-old Beltran remained a member of the working class he represented.

Beltran was detained in 2006 amid a crackdown on progressive politicians, human rights campaigners, unionists, journalists and religious leaders. The congressman was arrested on charges dating back to the era of Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos in the early 1980s and were quashed in 1988. Since then, further trumped up charges of sedition were laid. Beltran had been held under hospital detention for sixteen months but an international campaign succeeded in setting him free.

A statement by the Auckland-based Indonesia Human Rights Committee said:
The Indonesia Human Rights Committee takes a close interest in the human rights and justice issues in the Asia-Pacific region.
We therefore mourn the loss of Congressman Crispin Beltran “Ka Bel”, a great man and an exemplary leader, with his family, his friends and the Filipino people. His untimely death is a great loss to all freedom-loving citizens. His life is a concrete example of the struggles ordinary people wanting to have a better and decent life.
Ka Bel had a very challenging and colourful life. From the Marcos martial law to Arroyo’s ‘undeclared martial law’ he never stopped fighting for the poor people. He was a true defender of the workers, peasants, urban poor and other marginalised sectors of the toiling masses. He was also a staunch critic of privatisation, deregulation and other destructive policies of globalisation.
His speech in the plenary after he was freed by the Arroyo government sums up well the kind of man he was. He said: "I am innocent of the rebellion charge against me. It's neither a sin nor against the law to speak against graft and corruption and the killing of hundreds of innocent civilians.”
Not only was he involved in national politics but also in international issues. Ka Bel also stood against the United States' war of aggression on Iraq and its war on terror. He was steadfast in his call for respect for national sovereignty and international unity against foreign intervention.
As a parliamentarian, he was incorruptible and stood for his principles. In his three terms in Congress he was awarded the Filipino of the Year and Most Outstanding Congressman honours for four consecutive years from 2002 – 2005. In 2006 was judged part of the Congressional Hall of Fame.
One of his famous quotes was: "If helping the poor is a crime, and fighting for freedom is rebellion, then I plead guilty as charged."
His sister Gerodia Beltran-Mirafuentes said: “He was a politician of the poor. He died a poor man.”

• Ka Bel - Philippine Daily Inquirer editorial
• Congressman Beltran dies
• Beltran dies still poorest congressman
• The great hero of the working class
• Clark must follow through on Philippines human rights