On Friday, 11 May - oppose defence ties with Indonesia!

New Zealand will resume military ties with Indonesia this month.

An Indonesian officer will attend the NZDF Command and Staff College course in Trentham which begins on May 14, 2007. Defence ties were suspended in September 1999 when horrific violence engulfed East Timor. The New Zealand government overlooks:

• the military's responsibility for ongoing human rights violations especially in conflict areas such as West Papua. Its territorial structure facilitates the suppression of dissent;
• that the generals responsible for the 24 year brutal occupation of East Timor have not been held to account. It is the same for a litany of other historic human rights crimes in Indonesia in which the military is implicated;
• that the Indonesian military is still a law unto itself - largely unaccountable to civilian authority and able to call on independent funding including from protection rackets, prostitution and illegal logging; and
• that the New Zealand public were not consulted or even told about this significant policy change!

Timor-Leste’s Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation recommended that no state should resume military cooperation with Indonesia until there has been genuine ‘progress towards full democratisation, the subordination of the military to the rule of law and civilian government and strict adherence with international human rights, including respect for the right of self-determination.’

The New Zealand Government should heed this recommendation, instead of restoring defence ties with a military force emboldened by decades of impunity.

Demonstration at 12 noon, outside the Defence Headquarters, 204 to 234 Great North Road, Grey Lynn.

Organised by the Indonesia Human Rights Committee, for more information contact email.