From infoPAPUA.org
West Papuans here to stay: UNHCR
By The National
Jul 16, 2008, 05:09
1) Central Papua establishment wins support from 10 regencies
2) West Papuans here to stay: UNHCR
3) KPK urged to address corruption cases in Papua
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1) Central Papua establishment wins support from 10 regencies
The Jakarta Post , Mimika, Papua | Tue, 07/08/2008 7:13 PM | Headlines
The proposal for the establishment of Central Papua province had won support from 10 regencies, a team preparing the province said Tuesday.
Team leader Andreas Anggaibak said the 10 supporting regencies included Mimika, Nabire, Biak Numfor, Supiori, Yapen, Waropen, Puncak Jaya, Puncak Papua and Intan Jaya.
The team is supported by Amungme and Kamoro ethnic groups. (Markus/***)
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2) West Papuans here to stay: UNHCR
National (PNG) 8/7/08
THE United Nation’s High Commission for Refugees’ (UNHCR) regional representative Richard Towle has said that there was no need for the group of West Papuans temporarily residing at Apex Park, Boroko, to be resettled in a third country.
“This group and most West Papuans living in PNG have got an appropriate solution – what we call a durable solution – to remain in the country. There is no need for them to be resettled. And I have to say it would be difficult to persuade any traditional resettlement country like Australia or New Zealand to resettle this group,” Mr Towle said on Radio New Zealand International this week.
He was responding to calls last week by about 100 West Papuan refugees for an investigation into the UNHCR office in PNG. They claimed that the local office treated their bid for resettlement in a third country with bias.
Mr Towle said UNHCR would seriously consider any claims of misconduct against its officials in PNG.
The group had been evicted from four different public locations in the National Capital District over a nine-month period.
Local NGOs have raised concerns over their poor living conditions while the refugees themselves have accused the UNHCR of ignoring their resettlement bid.
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ANTARA News 07/09/08 00:52
3) KPK urged to address corruption cases in Papua
Jayapura (ANTARA News) - A local religious leader said the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has so far not paid any attention to or touched suspected corruption cases involving serving and former office-holders in Papua`s executive and legislative branches at provincial and district or municipal levels, creating the impression the KPK was "discriminative" in carrying out its mission.
Rev Socratez Sofyan Yoman, chairman of the Papua Baptist Churches Association, said corruption was being committed at all government administrative levels without anything being done to fight it, causing people to lose confidence in the government.
"People want the executive and legislative branches of government to remain clean but in reality enormous sums of money meant to improve the community`s welfare have been embezzled or misappropriated by executive or legislative officials. The KPK seems still unwilling to come to Papua to solve this complex problem," he said.
Socratez predicted, if the KPK failed to take up and solve suspected corruption cases in Papua, the people in Indonesia`s most-eastern province would sooner or later lose their belief in a legitimate, clean and corruption-, collusion- and nepotism-free government , followed by discontentment about the government and finally the outbreak of vertical and horizontal conflicts.
There were many suspected big-time corruption cases in Papua but none of them had so far been investigated seriously , much less settled in court. All reported cases ended up being shelved by police, public prosecutors or judges under all sorts of pretexts such as "lack of evidence` or the conclusion that the cases merely involved "administrative errors." he said.
Among the suspected corruption cases that had so far remained untouched by the KPK were one involving tens of billions of rupiah in the Waropen district administration, one in the Mimika district administration when it was led by former district chief Klemen Tinal , another one in Timika district affecting a state-owned building.
Anther big case happened in Puncak Jaya district, namely in relation with the Mulia Hydropower Plant project costing Rp11,275,465,000 and managed by Papua province`s energy and mineral resources office in cooperation with PT Bumi Cipta Alam Selaras.
"If the KPK does not come to Puncak Jaya, Mimika and Waropen and other districts soon to handle the corruption cases, the local people`s discontent and loss of confidence could turn into nationally disintegrative attitudes and actions," Socratez warned.
Papuan people knew the central government had allocated trillions of rupiah in funds to develop their region, especially for the benefit of the province`s indigenous people. Yet there were no signs of improvement in the people`s health care, family nutrition, education, infrastructure facilities and economic welfare in general, the clergyman said.(*)
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