The destruction of West Papua's farmland and forests represents an ecological and cultural disaster, compounding the atrocious human rights record on the island.
On cosmic harmony, extraction, and the seventy-three dead.
“The West Papuans have become the victims of Australia’s regional foreign policy arrangements that prop up the anti-refugee policies of Operation Sovereign Borders.” Ian Rintoul, Refugee Action Coalition. Fifty-two years…
This post has been proferred by Imogen, a reader of Blak and Black. As South Korean-born Dami Im’s X-Factor win in Australia is celebrated with a number one single it’s a shame…
On the ground floor of the Art Gallery of NSW I saw one of the most moving pieces of sculpture I can remember visiting. It did not surpass the sublime…
“We recognize international law …” Every country that is a member of the United Nations recognizes international law, Bob, at least as far as it serves their purposes. It seems…
The racism that permeates Australia has not altered since the days of the blackbirders.
Dusk is falling across Melbourne and West Papua, but not over the dreams of the Papuan people. Today, remembering 51 years of oppression having been denied the right to self-determination,…
Judgement is our oldest belief, our most habitual holding-true or holding un-true, an assertion or denial, a certainty that something is thus not otherwise, a belief that here we really…
West Papua is being exploited for it's resources, environmentally polluted and it's people fail to benefit from the profits.
We were about eighteen miles east of Guernica when Anton pulled to the side of the road jammed on the brakes and started shouting. He pointed wildly ahead, and my…
Indonesia's Detachment 88 has killed West Papuan independence activist Mako Tabuni.
Sydney: city of mystery, city of marvels. Sydney: its foreshores once teeming with Gadigal; now a captive city pregnant with memories, enveloped by memories of a Gadigal Atlantis. The traditional…
Last weekend I took a stroll through the Mesopotamia exhibition at the Melbourne Museum. While reading the commentary attached to a number of the artefacts I realised, in a profound…
Fragments from the Alfoxden Notebook There he would stand In the still covert of some [lonesome?] rock, Or gaze upon the moon until its light Fell like a strain of…
Complicity takes many forms, as discussed in posts by both Bakchos and me. Many believe that silent complicity is the least culpable, but to my mind if the silence enables…
Ernst & Young has its fingers in projects that disadvantage Indigenous people across the world, including in West Papua.
Little fly, Thy summer’s play My thoughtless hand Has brushed away. Am not I A fly like thee? Or art not thou A man like me? For I dance And…
The TNI under Suharto was seen as different from other armies because: Indonesian army sees itself as quite different from other armies in the world, because it was never created…
What is self-determination? The notion of self-determination as a universal principle, whether viewed through a political, moral, or legal lens, has been and continues to be imprecise and in dire…