In the face of state repression and international indifference by Indonesian authorities, West Papuan
activists have been locked in a life or death struggle for independence.
activists have been locked in a life or death struggle for independence.
Al Jazeera's People & Power reports on one of the most forgotten conflicts in the world.
Airi Ingram and Jason MacLeod trace the upsurge in regional Pacific support for the free West Papua movement. They conclude that even if politicians have traditionally been slow to respond, "ordinary people in this part of the Pacific are painfully aware that the West Papuan people continue to live under the gun". And the good news is that even politicians are now starting to wake up and support the cause, especially in neighbouring Papua New Guinea.
MELANESIAN support for a free West Papua has always been high. Travel throughout Papua New Guinea and you will often hear people say that West Papua and Papua New Guinea is "wanpela graun" – one land – and that West Papuans on the other side of the border are family and kin.
In the Solomon Islands, Kanaky, Fiji and especially Vanuatu, people will tell you that “Melanesia is not free until West Papua is free”. This was the promise that the late Father Walter Lini, Vanuatu’s first prime minister, made.
Ordinary people in this part of the Pacific are painfully aware that the West Papuan people continue to live under the gun. It is the politicians in Melanesia who have been slow to take up the cause.
But that may be changing.