Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Activists, media freedom advocates plan ‘global action’ for West Papua

"Gagged" West Papua. Instagram montage by tuckwolf_
By Pacific Media Watch

MEDIA freedom advocates and human rights activists are planning a “global action” for West Papua with demonstrations marking UNESCO world press freedom day events in Jakarta next week.

The advocates want to focus global attention on the “media blackout” long imposed by Indonesian authorities, in spite of promises to open up access to the two Melanesian provinces of Papua and West Papua adjoining independent Papua New Guinea.

The global action will begin on May 1 and run for three days climaxing with World Press Freedom Day on May 3.

Prominent UK-based West Papuan lawyer and civil rights campaigner Benny Wenda will then pay a visit to New Zealand the following week to raise awareness.

Monday, April 10, 2017

Latest West Papua journalist blacklisting another serious violation by Indonesia


French journalist Cyril Payen is still barred from entering Indonesia following his 2015 documentary film, Indonésie : la guerre oubliée des Papous (The Forgotten War in Papua).

Analysis by Tempo in Pacific Media Watch

THE blacklisting of Jack Hewson, a freelance journalist working for Al Jazeera, shows the Indonesian government’s paranoia towards foreign journalists.

The government should allow the foreign press to cover Papua. Preventing journalists from reporting the facts there is not a good testament on the claim of press freedom in Indonesia.

Hewson, who is based in Jakarta, planned to report on the Freeport issue from Timika in Papua. But after leaving for the Philippines last week, he learned that he has been banned from returning to Indonesia for no clear reason.

It transpires that the request for the ban came from the Indonesian Military (TNI).

According to the Immigration Directorate General, Hewson is suspected of “dangerous activities, endangering security and public order”.

Friday, April 7, 2017

LIVE: CAFCA’s Murray Horton on NZ independence and foreign policy

Graphic: Concept art for Planet of the Apes

Courtesy of the Pacific Media Centre and Asia Pacific Report

 

TIME FOR INDEPENDENCE FROM A CRUMBLING US EMPIRE - Murray Horton
The advent of President Donald Trump in the US provides an unprecedented opportunity to take a good, hard look at Aotearoa's place in the world.  And to ask the question - why are we still a loyal member of the American Empire?

As the old saying goes, you are judged by the company you keep.

CAFCA Murray Horton says it's time for this country to pull the plug, to finish the business started in the 1980s, which saw us out of ANZUS, and break the chains -- military, intelligence, economic and cultural -- that continue to bind us to the American Empire.

Speaker: Murray Horton, national organiser of the Christchurch-based Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa (CAFCA). Video in two parts.

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