Asia Pacific Report, the Auckland-based independent news and analysis website, has been increasingly targeted by Indonesian trolls over the past three months, involving a spate of “letters to the editor” and social media attacks.
The indigenous people of West Papua have rejected the extension of special autonomy and the planned expansion of new provinces announced by the central government of Indonesia. A special report by a Papuan contributor.
The University of the South Pacific community has protested over the draconian deportation today of USP’s reformist vice-chancellor Professor Pal Ahluwalia and his wife and called on the government to issue a formal apology to the academic, a Canadian, for the violation of human rights.
Presentations at the AUT Pacific Media Centre-organised event on Tuesday included cross-cultural documentaries, an industry panel on “transition”, Pasifika “brown table” initiatives, a forthcoming Asia-Pacific conference, and an Internews project on climate and coronavirus reportage.
Luc Tutugoro, a New Zealand-based Kanak: “We are creeping towards Kanak sovereignty. Work on the abstentions will be the key focus for the future – as well as a true and authentic dialogue, no matter what the result of the third and last [independence] referendum will be.”
The censored item was purportedly because of “nudity” in a photograph published by the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) of a protest in the West Papuan capital Jayapura in August last year during the Papuan Uprising against Indonesian racism and oppression that began in Surabaya, Java.
While the globe struggles to cope with the deadly onslaught of the covid-19 pandemic, communicators, historians, journalists and activists have been deploying innovative ways of marking three nuclear-related anniversaries in barely a month.
FLASHBACK 35 YEARS: The bombed ship’s pioneering environmental work has since been carried on by Rainbow Warrior II and the state-of-the-art eco campaign ship Rainbow Warrior III. Today the focus is on climate refugees, the lack of adequate health compensation for the Polynesians who suffered radiation and failure to provide proper clean-up of the French nuclear testing zones that are still off-limits after almost a quarter century. Tests were carried out by balloon, derrick, in the lagoon and in a series of underground shafts which have threatened the stability of the 60 km long atoll, leaving it fractured “like Swiss cheese”.
“Laws are part of our solution to protect those who are assaulted and attacked but that is not enough. The responsibility rests with every citizen. Our behaviour and our attitude and how we fashion the society we want to live in will deliver this homeland of ours.” – Open letter from Dame Meg Taylor to the people of Papua New Guinea
Associate Professor Tarcisius Kabutaulaka accuses a small group of people of “selfishly and disrespectfully desecrating” this “sacred place of learning” for the Pacific which celebrated a half century two years ago.