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Letter: Why so much violence in Papua?
For more than 300 years, Indonesia was under colonial rule by the Portuguese, the British and the Dutch
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or more than 300 years, Indonesia was under colonial rule by the Portuguese, the British and the Dutch.
For more than 300 years, Indonesians were brutally oppressed while Indonesia’s natural resources were robbed by foreign powers. In 1945, Sukarno and his followers finally stood up and liberated Indonesia from all colonial powers.
Finally, the Indonesian people were freed from all foreign oppression. For more than 40 years now, Indonesia’s political elite and military power brokers have been robbing Papua from its natural resources and brutally oppressing its people; actions which are openly condoned by the UN and the US.
Ever since August 1969 and the farce that was called “the Act of Free Choice”, Indonesia’s political elite and power brokers have all of a sudden become oppressors themselves and implemented the same rules their former oppressors had done for centuries in Indonesia.
Papuans are now waking up to the same reality as Sukarno and his followers did in 1945. It is no wonder that Papua is the site of so much violence.
Dennis G. Kloeth
Jakarta
