International Parliament for West Papua stage protest against rise in troops in Papua

By Radio New Zeland International Nov 4, 2008, 12:36
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Around 100 protesters have staged a rally against an alleged increase in militarism in Indonesia’ s Papua province outside the Provincial Legislative Council building in Jayapura.The Jakarta Post reports that the protestors, who are members of the International Parliament for West Papua (IPWP), claim they’re seeing an increasing presence of fully armed Indonesia Military (TNI) soldiers milling around in villages and towns.
In his speech to address the rally, IPWP Papua coordinator Buchtar Tabuni said that the number of armed troops in Papua gave the impression there was a war taking place.He said the TNI are supposed to ward off expansion threats from outside, not watch people in towns.The IPWP was established in recent months in London by two British parliamentarians with the aim of revising the 1969 Act of Free Choice under which papua was incorporated into Indonesia, a referendum which is widely thought to have been stage-managed.The Papuan legislative council speaker John Ibo said he would pass on the protesters’ request to the authorities for explanations about the increasing number of soldiers in Papua. http://www.rnzi.com/pages/news.php?op=read&id=42889
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