West Papuan independence day remembered
On December 1st in 1961, in the then Dutch colony of West Papua, the morning star flag, a symbol of independence, was raised for the first time. Despite a US department of state survey in the 1960s finding that an overwhelming majority of Papuans desired independence, the province was absorbed into Indonesia, after a UN-led referendum in 1969 that is widely condemned as being rigged to favour Indonesian control. On the weekend, groups in West Papua would once gather in peaceful ceremonies to raise the flag. This time they gathered to demand an end to the presence of the Indonesian military in the province, which the UN and Amnesty international both claim are responsible for widespread human rights abuses. The Wire spoke to Jonah Wenda, a West Papuan independence activist based in the capital Jayapura, about the importance of December 1st to his countrymen.