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ug. 30, p5

Two French tourists detained at the Jayapura Immigration Office claim they were simply carrying out their journalistic duties while in Papua.

'€œApart from claiming to be journalists from French television station Arte TV, they claimed they were on a trip to Jayapura and Wamena to carry out journalistic duties and meet a group that wished to separate from the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia,'€ Jayapura Immigration Office head Gardu Tampubolon told Antara news agency on Friday.

Your comments:

The Indonesian authorities want to prevent journalists from entering Papua and West Papua to report on the atrocities perpetrated there by the military and police, or the plundering of natural resources carried out by corporations. Permits are rarely issued to foreign journalists and when they are, these journalists are shadowed by one or more intelligence officers.

Thomas Dandois and Valentine Bourrat work for the French-German TV channel Arte, which is a reference both in Europe and the rest of the world. Dandois is a seasoned investigative reporter, who has reported from the Sahel where he was arrested and imprisoned for one month.

Arresting these two highly qualified professional journalists and accusing them of subversion and other misconduct only adds to the poor record of Indonesia regarding press freedom, and it publicizes the repression in Papua and West Papua even more.

Congratulations to these courageous journalists, and shame on the Indonesian authorities. Free our journalists and free West Papua.

Jan Karl

Thomas Dandois is a seasoned investigative reporter. The Indonesian police and immigration service should treat him with the respect he deserves. He and his assistant should be released without delay.

The whereabouts of the local fixer who accompanied them should be determined, and he should be released, too, without delay. We also want to know what has happened to the Papuans who were interviewed by Dandois and Bourrat? Why were they arrested? Is this just because they accepted a request to be interviewed by a foreign journalist?

Sabar P

Allowing access to journalists would be an asset in exposing criminal elements in Indonesia'€™s bureaucracy. There must be no mercy shown to these people who threaten the unity of this country; they are little more than traitors and saboteurs. President-elect Joko Widodo needs to take a tough stance, not only against these criminal elements but also against those people who take up arms.

A number of the protesters here don'€™t understand the complexity of moving tribal societies into a 21st century economy. It'€™s not like the American War of Independence or Indonesia'€™s struggle for independence because in these cases, people were aware of the concept of a modern nation state. Indonesia is a much better vehicle for this transformation to take place in Papua than if Papua were to become an independent state.

Jagera

While many accuse the central government of doing a '€œdirty job'€ in Papua, a lot of people from Papua New Guinea (PNG) have moved across to Indonesia because the government has built better infrastructure and offers social services to its people, while the PNG government does not. And yet, you still blind yourself to this fact. Shame on you.

Mans Junior