Freedom for West Papua

While everyone is encouraged to sign this petition, it was originally created to support action inspired by the eBook, Crying Freedom (previously called Vanishing Tribes) - an illustrated story written as a tribute to fifty years of peaceful resistance in West Papua. Further explanation is available on the website at cryingfreedom.org for those who wish to better understand the reason for this simple petition.

Please help us ask the United Nations to fulfill their historic duty to protect West Papuans from the current military occupation by Indonesia, and from the associated militarized commerce that is ravaging this precious land and its peoples to the point of total destruction.

This simple petition is supported by the following facts:

1. The right of self-determination is articulated in article 3 of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples;
2. In May 2013, the UN General Assembly voted to place French Polynesia back on their list of territories to be decolonized;
3. West Papua was also on the decolonization list from 1994 to 1962, and was taken off in a way that violated indigenous and fundamental human rights;
4. West Papua clearly meets the UN list criteria set down in resolution 1541 (XV).

(If West Papua cannot be granted de facto independence and acknowledged as an existing country, we would hope that the region at least be re-instated on the list of Non-Self-Governing Territories, opened to journalists from any nation, and the people of West Papua finally be given their first real opportunity to vote in a referendum properly supervised by the UN under the auspices of UN-sponsored armed forces. See the many other petitions for West Papua asking for these kinds of outcomes.)

OK - here is the entire petition in one sentence: