What is the United Liberation Movement for West Papua?

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"United Liberation Movement for West Papua ~ its mission, activities, achievements" was presented by Jacob Rumbiak to the International League of Peoples Struggle Webinar on 28 July 2020.

Tree-memorials for West Papua & UN Sec-General Hammarskjöld

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On 13 September 2020, the WP Womens Office in Docklands and activists in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are planting a tree in honour of Dag Hammarskjöld, the UN Sec-General found dead on 18 September 1961 near the border of the DRC where he was mediating post-independence conflict. Hammarskjöld's death, which is still being investigated, precluded his presentation to the 1961 UN General Assembly of a Decolonisation Program for the Non-Self-Governing Territory of Nederlands-Nieuw Guinea (West Papua) that would have deterred Indonesia from invading the territory in 1962, and thus rendered unnecessary the so-called peace treaty (New York Agreement) that facilitated Indonesia's incorporation of the territory.

Dag Hammarskjöld, West Papua, and the United Nations

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Since the 2015 publication of Greg Poulgrain's The Incubus of Intervention: conflicting Indonesia strategies of John F. Kennedy and Allen Dulles we have known that Secretary-General Hammarskjöld was about to introduce a Decolonisation Program in Netherlands New Guinea whereby the West Papuan people would be recognised as the sovereign owners of their land, and UN officers would assist an independent West Papuan government for five years. Hammarskjöld intended to present the program to the 1961 General Assembly. His death just days before the opening of the Assembly meant the motion was debated without his authoritative and influential presence, and didn't garner the necessary two-thirds majority support. The UN’s failure to adopt a policy of self-determination for West Papua opened the way for an American diplomat—appointed by Acting Sec-General U Thant—to mediate an agreement that facilitated Indonesia’s incorporation of West Papua. And we all know the story after that.

What’s going on in West Papua behind COVID-19?

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ULMWP Spokesperson Jacob Rumbiak reports on Jakarta's refusal to listen to its governor's COVID warning to halt flights from Jakarta to West Papua, and Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto exacts his appointment-promise to exterminate and extinguish the Papuan independence movement.

Indonesia pressured to begin negotiating with ULMWP

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As Defense Minister (and former general) Prabowo Subianto escalates Indonesia’s war against West Papuans, the Jokowi government is under pressure to respond to the recommendation of its provincial government to negotiate peace and self-determination with the United Liberation Movement for West Papua.

West Papua 1942-2022: the legals, politics, and only way forward

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West Papua 1942-2022: the legals, politics, and the only way forward is a succinct but comprehensive image-and-text study guide of the West Papuans’ experience of World War II, and as a progressive UN Non-Self-Governing Territory during the 1950s; of the UN's failure in November 1961 to uphold its founding principle, self-determination, in the context of the West Papuans' rights, Dag Hammarskjöld's assassination, the belligerence of the Indonesian Republic, and the self-interest of the CIA's Allen Dulles and the JFK administration. It includes legal commentary on the New York Agreement (1962—69) and a detailed rebuttal of the claims Indonesia used to justify its colonisation of the Papuans’ 459,412 kms2 of richly resourced territory. The final section outlines West Papuans’ most recent resistance and nation-making, including being listed on the UN Decolonisation Agenda (the motion which UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld was about to present to the 1961 UN General Assembly).

Two important legal documents: West Papua: real-politik v international law; & Papua’s right to self-determination under international law

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The legal papers in this post set out the principles of International Law relating to the New York Agreement (1962-1969) by which Indonesia, the Netherlands, and the United Nations, all pursued by the United States of America, aborted the decolonisation project of the Non-Self-Governing of Netherlands New Guinea, via UNGA Res. 1752 (XVII) in 1962 and UN Res. 2504 (XXIV). UN Res.2504 in 1969, passed unanimously by the UN Member States (84,0) formally "noted" but did not formally reject the result of the "Act of Free Choice" which was not an act of self-determination, but a web of intrigue, bribery, duress by threat, and coercion by propaganda and fraudulent promises in which 1025 carefully selected, indoctrinated and controlled members of West Papua's indigenous population of almost 800,000, under the close scrutiny of armed Indonesian security personnel, agreed unanimously to commit their peoples to integration of their homeland with the State of Indonesia.

West Papuans implore Australian support after 1 Dec brutalities

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Indonesian military-police, and intelligence in civilian clothes, violated the universal tenets of freedom of expression and assembly during a suite of operations against indigenous Melanesian West Papuans honouring their historic national day on 1 December.

ULMWP Pilgrimage to Canberra, 9/9/19

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On 9 September 2019 the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) travelled to Canberra with a petition of 17,000 signatures asking the government to vote for motions supporting West Papua's self-determination in the UN General Assembly. Jacob Rumbiak and Ronny Kareni, with members of Australia West Papua Association (Melb) and FRWP Womens' Office (Docklands) started the pilgrimage at the Netherlands Australia War Memorial to honour the nation's Dutch colonial heritage, crossed Lake Burley Griffin to the Aboriginal Tent Embassy to acknowledge Indigenous Sovereignty, and concluded at Parliament House with a Media Conference during which Andrew Wilkie MP and Greens Senators Richard di Natale and Janet Rice were handed the box of signatures. Later in the day Senator di Natale tabled the petition in the Senate. Three days later Nadine Rutter, who organised the petition, presented it to Herman Wainggai (ULMWP'S UN Representative) at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.

Jacob Rumbiak, Religious Freedom Institute, Bangkok, November 2019

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'The Case for Freedom of Religion in West Papua's struggle for Self-determination' by Jacob Rumbiak for the Religious Freedom Institute Conference in Bangkok, 4-6 November 2019. Eleven informative powerpoints, including bibliography, with a PDF for downloading.

Letter from ULMWP Spokesperson to Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Marise Payne, October 2019

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Letter to Senator Marise Payne, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Australian Parliament, from ULMWP Spokesperson Jacob Rumbiak, requesting her help to dissuade the Indonesian Republic from its aggressive nationalist performance and Syria-like development in West Papua by establishing a quiet dialogue with the new Vice-President Ma'ruf Amin. Vice-President Amin, as Chairman of the Ulema Council of Indonesia, is the republic’s most powerful Muslim cleric, and has the moral and political authority to successfully argue for the recall of Indonesia's Islamic militia from West Papua.

West Papua Cartoon Exhibition

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An exhibition of twenty-nine works by Australia's most gifted and beloved cartoonists published in 2006 after the arrival of forty-three asylum seekers from West Papua.  The cartoons narrate and amplify the war-of-words between Canberra and Jakarta, and between Australian politicians, over the refugees' claims of genocide and Indonesia's racist militarized rule.  That Australia's media moguls published their employees' works suggests that they too believed it was time to question Australia's long-standing support of the Indonesian colonial occupation.

West Papua splits Indonesia: Jokowi to talk to ULMWP, Wiranto flies in troops

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As rallies and fires mark the end of colonial authority in West Papua, Indonesian President Jokowi agreed to formal dialogue with the United Liberation Movement for West Papua. At the same time the Minister for Political, Legal & Security Affairs (former military-general Wiranto) flies hundreds of Indonesian soldiers into West Papua and hundreds of Indonesian civilians out.

Global Petition to Parliament House, Canberra, 9 Sept 2019

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Today thousands of Australians join with the thousands of West Papuans who in recent weeks have taken to the streets demonstrating against racist abuse, calling for the UN to be allowed access to West Papua and asking for a supervised referendum on independence.

ULMWP Statement: Parliament House, Canberra, 9 Sep 2019

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The ULMWP presented an official statement as a petition from thousands of Australians is presented to politicians in Canberra at a Press Conference in Parliament House.

Dutch guerilla’s memoir of WWII in Netherlands (West) Nieuw Guinea

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'We fought in the Jungle: my guerrilla struggle in New Guinea in the Second World War' is the English translation of em>Vij Vochten in het bos a WWII memoir by Sergeant Maurits Christiaan Kokkelink, which was published in Amsterdam in 1956 but never reprinted, and was found in a second-hand bookstore in Ljouwert, capital of the far northern province of Friesland.
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