ENVIRONMENT: Indonesian Troops Fire on Demonstrators in Irian Jaya

By Pratap Chatterjee Reprint | | Print |

Pratap Chatterjee

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug 23 1997 (IPS) - Indonesian troops in Irian Jaya, the western sector of the island of New Guinea, opened fire Friday on a group of demonstrators attemtping to block an access road to a goldmine and killed two Ekari indigenous men, witnesses said.

In a telephone call from the island the witness said demonstrators were protesting over the continued operations of a gold mine operated by the New Orleans based company Freeport McMoran.

Garland Robinette, a Freeport spokesman in New Orleans, refused all comment on the incident. “We have nothing to say to you. Have a good day,” he told reporters.

In the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, Ed Pressman, another Freeport spokesman declared there had been a minor indident at the mine but no damage had been caused. “Roving bands of Ekari at one point stole a tractor and tried to dig up the road, but nothing is going on that is disrupting the mine,” he said.

The island, which is home to more than 1,000 indigenous tribes like the Amungme, the Dani, the Ekari, the Komoro, the Moni and the Nduga, is also the site of Freeport’s biggest money spinner – the world’s largest open cast gold mine and the third largest copper mine.

Tension has been building in the region after the company revealed plans to pay out about 10 million dollars for disruption caused by the mining, but omitted payments to the Amungme and Komoro peoples who are most affected by the thousands of tons of toxic mining waste being dumped in local rivers, activists said.

The compensation fund was created last year after riots shut down the mine after reports that a company vehicle had killed a local Dani tribesman. Offices, schools, shopping centres, auto shops, computer facilities, owned by Freeport were destroyed and nine Freeport security staff were reported seriously injured in the incident.

This week, another two people reportedly died after being injured in an incident involving a Freeport vehicle, according to reports from west New Guinea. Another two persons were injured in a separate road incident, activists said.

A local Roman Catholic priest, tried to calm angry protestors who gathered in Timika Thursday but the Ekari ignored appeals to disperse and marched to a Freeport residential complex where they threw missiles at employees homes, witnesses said.

The Indonesian military commander of the region sought help from the leader of the Amungme Tribal Council, Tom Beanal, to help end the blockade. Beanal, who has a six billion dollar lawsuit against Freeport pending in New Orleans courts, said: “Only now that trouble has flared up do you bother to come to us. We have been warning the government of serious problems in the com munity here but no one has taken any notice.”

On Friday truckloads of soldiers arrived to disperse the protestors who fired arrows at them. The soldiers first fired shots into the air to warn the Ekari but then matters got out of hand.

“One man died on the spot when a bullet went through his head and came out through his chin. The body is now being kept by his family. The second man died after being shot in the stomach. His body is now in a local hospital,” a military spokesman told local reporters.

In another incident Friday, six people were injured in Timika when a group of Moni tribespeople marching on local government offices were dispersed by baton-wielding soldiers, witnesses said.