Behind the New York Agreement on West Papua

Behind the New York Agreement on West Papua

John Saltford, Alumni, Department of Political and Asian Studies,
University of Hull, United Kingdom, johnsaltford@hotmail.com

The opinion piece by the Dupito Simamora, an Indonesian
diplomat to the United Nations, on revisiting the 1962 New York
Agreement (The Jakarta Post, Aug. 19) was very interesting. I
also fully agree with him that it is time to review the issue in
a "comprehensive and objective manner".

However, to assist with the process of this objective review
one needs to look at what the New York Agreement actually
guaranteed. One can then compare this with what took place and so
come to a conclusion as to whether it was such a success story
for the UN. Or, as others claim, was the agreement's
implementation just a crudely manipulated stunt that
fundamentally ignored the rights guaranteed to the West Papuans
by the UN, Indonesia and the Netherlands?

The first point is that there are arguments on both sides of
the debate over whether West Papua should have gone to Indonesia
in 1949. However, in a sense these arguments are irrelevant
because the UN-brokered New York Agreement, signed by Indonesia
and the Netherlands, guaranteed the West Papuan people the right
to self-determination, i.e. it was for them, and no one else, to
decide whether they were Indonesian or an independent state.

Under Article 2 of the Agreement, the Dutch handed over West
Papua to a temporary UN authority (UNTEA) on Oct. 1, 1962. After
seven months the UN then transferred control to Jakarta prior to
any act of self-determination.

On the UN's record during its seven month administration of
West Papua (Oct. 1, 1962-May 1, 1963), perhaps a couple of
comments from the UN officials who were actually there will
suffice. The first was made in a confidential letter by the
UNTEA Divisional Commissioner for Merauke in December 1962:

"If the date [of our departure] is advanced or if the
Agreement is changed doing away with a plebiscite, I do not
expect widespread disturbances because we have sufficient forces
to control the situation -- a whiff of grapeshot can easily
control the situation if that is what UNTEA wants."

The second remark was by the Merauke Commissioner's colleague
in charge of Biak:

"I have yet to meet any thinking, sober, generally responsible
Papuan who sees any good in the coming link with Indonesia ...
Unwelcome as the anxiety and resistance of thinking Papuans maybe
it is of course hardly surprising if one is not under pressure to
close one's eyes to what is in fact happening to this people at
the hands of the three parties to the Agreement."

Whatever one makes of these comments, they hardly describe a
situation that today's UN would want to use as a model for future
operations.

But returning to the New York Agreement, if one is to pass
judgment on its implementation, it is necessary to consider four
key articles

Under Article 16, a number of UN experts were to remain in the
territory following the transfer of administrative responsibility
to Indonesia. Their primary task was to advise and assist the
Indonesians in their preparations for Papuan self-determination
that was to take place before the end of 1969. But these experts
were never deployed because Indonesia objected.

Under Article 22, the UN and Indonesia had to guarantee fully
the rights, including the rights of free speech, freedom of
movement and of assembly of the Papuans.

These rights were not upheld, even during the UN
administration, and with no UN staff in the territory once
Jakarta took over, Indonesia was free to act as it pleased. The
official 1969 UN report actually admits that the article had not
been fully implemented adding "the [Indonesian] Administration
exercised at all times a tight political control over the
population".

Under Article 17, one year prior to self-determination, the
Secretary-General was to appoint a representative who would lead
a team of UN officials, including those already stationed in the
territory. Their task was to continue and build on the work
outlined in Article 16 and remain until the act of self-
determination was complete.

A Bolivian diplomat, Ortiz Sanz, was appointed but, as he made
clear in his official report, the non-implementation of Article
16 meant that there was no experienced UN staff in the territory
for him to lead. Instead he had to make do with a newly arrived
team of 16 who were supposed to assist and observe an act of
self-determination in a vast territory covering 160,150 square
miles.

Under Article 18, all adult Papuans had the right to
participate in an act of self-determination to be carried out in
accordance with international practice.

This central tenet of the agreement was never implemented. The
UN effectively stood by as Indonesia selected 1,022 West Papuans
to vote publicly and unanimously in favor of integration with
Indonesia. The final wording of the UN report says only that the
procedure had been carried out in accordance with "Indonesian",
and not "international" practice as specified in the article.

As the writer Simamora concedes, retired UN under-secretary-
general Narasimhan Chakravarty has been quoted saying that the
Act of Free Choice was "just a whitewash." But what Simamora does
not mention is that Narasimhan also adds: "The mood at the UN was
to get rid of this problem as quickly as possible ...Nobody gave
a thought to the fact that there were a million people there who
had their fundamental rights trampled ... How could anyone have
seriously believed that all voters unanimously decided to join
his (Soeharto's) regime? "

Does Simamora seriously believe this? It certainly appears so.
But when has a 100 percent vote of this kind ever been considered
as anything but a sham? The answer of course is never. Those
1,022 "representatives" represented nothing but the official will
of Jakarta.

Importantly, Narasimhan's claims are backed up repeatedly in
recently de-classified documents emerging from the archives of
the UN and elsewhere. In one example, a 1968 U.S. Embassy
telegram reports that UN representative Ortiz Sanz "concedes that
it would be inconceivable from the point of view of the interests
of the UN as well as Indonesia, that a result other than the
continuance of West (Papua) within Indonesian sovereignty should
emerge".

In a further example, a 1969 British document notes that the
UN Secretariat in New York "appear only too anxious to get shot
of the problem as quickly and smoothly as possible." Another
British official at the time commented, "Privately, however, we
recognize that the people of West Irian have no desire to be
ruled by the Indonesians ... and that the process of consultation
did not a allow a genuinely free choice to be made."

To conclude, there is certainly a case for the UN to answer
and a review would be the fairest way of doing it. It is surely
in the best interests of West Papua, the UN and even Indonesia,
that the full facts surrounding the Act of Free Choice be
revealed. There is nothing to be gained from maintaining a
distorted version of history that can only further distort
current efforts to solve the West Papuan issue peacefully.

The writer's forthcoming book is The United Nations and the
Indonesian Takeover of West Papua 1962-1969 published by
Routledge-Curzon.