D

evelopment programs cannot proceed and are practically interrupted in times of conflict or violence. And dialogue, which is universally accepted as the best formula to settle problems of security and order, is not possible in situations of open conflict and violence.

Therefore, dialogue, which has been the commonly agreed mechanism to bring a permanent end to the prolonged, complicated problems of social and economic disparities in Papua (Papua and West Papua provinces) — oftentimes thus associated with sporadic demand for independence — is obviously interrupted. Worse is the fact that such security and order issues have never been properly addressed and in many cases, such problems have remained unsolved, with neither perpetrators nor masterminds having been uncovered or arrested.

The latest violence reported in Papua, where an Indonesian teacher and a German tourist were shot by unknown gunmen in two separate incidents, occurred on Tuesday.

The victim of the fatal shooting in Mulia, the capital of Puncak Jaya, was identified as Anton Arung Tambila, 36, an elementary school teacher. An unidentified man shot Arung in the head on Tuesday evening while he was serving customers at his sugar kiosk next to his house, killing him instantly.

Arung’s killing is the latest in a series of fatal shootings in Mulia, and the second civilian to fall prey to unidentified assailants in May alone. Arkilaus Refwutu, 48, a motorcycle taxi driver, was shot to death on May 17. A German tourist, identified as 55-year-old Pieter Dietmar Helmut, was shot several times in broad daylight by an unknown man while walking with his wife, Medina Pachon, on Jayapura Beach, about 10 kilometers from Jayapura’s downtown district.

The question is why such violent acts and shooting sprees remain rampant in the country’s easternmost province despite the heavy presence of security personnel there?

There is no official data available on the number of security personnel in Papua, but it is estimated that some 16,000 Indonesian Military (TNI) troops are stationed in Papua. If combined with the police, roughly at the same staffing levels as the TNI, there are over 30,000 security personnel on duty in the province. The figure excludes hundreds of intelligence officers deployed there.

The overall figure of security personnel should therefore be more than enough to cover the two relatively scarcely populated provinces and leave no room for repetition of such shootings. The previously agreed-upon dialogue should continue — and be prioritized.