JAYAPURA (Radio NZ International / France 24 / Pacific Media Watch): A West Papuan teacher who met with the two French journalists arrested last week has himself been arrested - without a warrant.
The Alliance of Democracy for Papua said that Areki Wanimbo, who is also a customary chief, was also initially denied access to a lawyer.
"Concern is growing for Wanimbo who was taken in by police without clear notice of what crime he is alleged to have committed," reported RNZI.
The Alliance said the arrest had given the false impression that Wanimbo and other West Papuans were criminals by association. This was because Indonesian police claimed that French mainstream journalists Thomas Dandois and Valentine Bourrat had been arrested on suspicion of "promoting instability and insecurity".
In fact, Dandois and Bourrat apparently angered the Indonesian government by investigating the poor living conditions of colonised West Papuans for France's Arte TV.
Dandois and Bourrat have been in custody for one week now. It is not known when they will be released.
Papua province police spokesman Sulistyo Pudjo Hartono told France 24 that the two could face up to five years in prison and a 500 million rupiah (US $42,000) fine.
Reporters Sans Frontieres and the International Federation of Journalists have called for them to be freed immediately.
Jayapura journalist Victor Mambor told a seminar in New Zealand earlier this month that there was still an effective ban on foreign journalists in West Papua. Foreign journalists had to be given special permits by the Indonesian regime and these were rarely granted for anything other than apolitical anthropological reporting.
Journalists who did get permits were trailed by Indonesian intelligence officers, whose accommodation and travel expenses were billed to their media houses.
The visa situation drove foreign journalists undercover. But it was forbidden for anyone entering West Papua on a tourist visa to report on the conditions there, Mambor said.
Independent New Zealand journalist Paul Bensemann, who last year reported undercover from West Papua, told PMW that constantly hiding from Indonesian police and intelligence operatives also meant that foreign journalists feared for the safety and wellbeing of their West Papuan sources.
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Pacific Media Watch
