West Papua Information Kit

West Papua is the joining of hundreds of traditional Melanesian nations to create a unified pan-Papuan nation for the protection of the diversity and unity of Papuan cultures and values.

Tens of thousands of years ago the ancestors of the Papuan people colonised the Australian continent and surrounding islands; several thousand years ago raising waters separated the southern mainland from New Guinea creating the Torres Strait. And for hundreds of years Europeans purchased Melanesian spices without knowing who the Asian traders were buying these from until the Protugese and Dutch merchants came looking. See history for further detail

The Papuan people are farmers, hunters and ordinary people wishing to live their own lives without foreign militia and mining companies plundering their families and the lands which they have managed in good health for thousands of years before the miners and terrorist came to their shores.

Transmigration is a term Indonesia uses to describe its colonial policy of exporting its own population from Asia to a colony like West Papua in the Pacific to slowly eliminate the colonised cultures and people. How many hundreds of thousands of people have been killed by the Indonesian military is not known, but that the Melanesian population of Western Papua is now a quarter or less of the Eastern side of the island is certain. See transmigration for further detail

The population chart presented here suggests that from 1966 to 2000 PNG Melanesian population enjoy an average population growth of 4.47% while West Papua's growth was 1.4% or a quarter of PNG's. Given the Indonesian government transferring of nearly a million people from Asia to this Pacific island during the same period; there is an apparant willingness by the successive Indonesian governments to see the elimination of Papuan populations and cultures. The Indonesian failure to support indigenous languages further supports an apparant willingness to continue a genocidal policy. See genocide for further detail

West Papuan cultures

Renown for their mountain home land which has been exevacted by the Freeport McMoRan corporation for its gold and copper, the Amungme now allegedly number 13,000 forced to live around Timika and other sites approved by the mine cmpany and Indonesian government.

Renown for woodcarving and warrior traditions the Asmat manage nearly 2 million hectre of tidal mangrove and lowland rainforest lands with a population still around 70,000.

The island of Biak is home of a language and sea faring culture share by some 30,000 people across Biak and neighbouring smaller islands.