A new report claims Indonesia's booming paper industry is responsible for widespread attacks on indigenous communities in Sumatra. The New York-based group Human Rights Watch also alleges police are helping suppress protests against the seizure of forest land, claiming land seizures and "brutal" assaults on local residents are commonplace. And it's calling on international donors to Indonesia to pressure Jakarta into taking action at a meeting in Bali later this month.

Presenter/Interviewer: Deborah Steele

Speakers: Mike Jendrzejczyk, Washington Director of Human Rights Watch's Asia Division

Jendrzejczyk: "We've been doing research for a year or so into the massive pulp and paper industry on the island of Sumatra, where there are major forestry lands that've been seized over the years, beginning in the 1980s under then president Suharto, and where local indigenous people are finding their livelihoods disappearing and often engaging in protests that then trigger very strong and sometimes violent responses from the company security forces, mobile police and company-fund militia.

"And we're hoping the issue will be discussed at the upcoming donor meeting in Bali, later this month, when forestry reform will not be on the agenda."

Steele: How widespread is this problem in Sumatra?

Jendrzejczyk: "It's a problem that's really escalated in Sumatra, where generally the pulp and paper industry in Indonesia puts the country into the top ten of the world's producers, but many of the lowland tropical forests are in Sumatra. These are lands traditionally claimed by indigenous communities who rely on them for rice farming and rubber tapping.

"But as these lands have been taken over and turned into huge platantions the loss of access to these lands have affected hundreds and hundreds of villagers who then feel they have nowhere else to turn for their livelihoods and who file land claims but find the police and military who have their own business interests are not in a position to be neutral arbitrers in those claims and those land disputes."

Steele: So what exactly is the role of security forces in this? How complicit are they in the actions of the timber companies?

Jendrzejczyk: "At two levels. One, at the stage when the lands were seized and this is mainly in the 1980s and the 1990s – state police and company militia, trained by the police, often did this violently and certainly usually with little or no legal process or compensation.

"Secondly when there have been protests, which took place in 2001 and through last year, mobile police brigades and police backing up company officials have been complicit in or stood by and watched as villagers have been beaten sometiems, very violently by company militia and others.

"Again the police have either assisted or in most cases done nothing to intervene to prevent these kinds of abuses."

Steele: What action do you hope the donors will take on this?

Jendrzejczyk: "Well, one immediate step would be for the donors at the Bali meeting to call for a complete and transparent audit of all military and police businesses.

"Secondly to call for the creation of an independent land board or an independent ombudsman who could deal with compensation disputes over seozed forestry land.

"And thirdly the problem of impunity must be addressed. That is the Indonesian government must take responsibility for prosecuting police and private company officials who were involved in attacks and other kinds of human rights abuses against villagers in Sumatra who are affected by this ongoing problem."

Steele: The report says that these attacks on indigenous communities, the lack of the rule of law and the rural violence threaten not only rural communities but also foriegn investment – how so?

Jendrzejczyk: "Well, at a couple of levels. First of all, some of the vast plantation supplying Asian pulp and paper, whcih is now Indonesia's largest paper producer, is piling up huge debt from its creditors and I should say that the overall pulp and paper industry in Sumatra now has debts of over $US20 billion.

"So it's not only having devastating consequences economically and in terms of human rights, but there's a huge economic price to be paid.

"This eventually is going to be passed on through these companies and creditors to the public who are somehow going to have to absorb the cost of these debts.

"So I think it is in Indonesia's direct self-interest if it wants to reform the whole forestry industry in a way that both protects the environment and protects economic growth, to begin to take these kinds of minimal reforms and again we think the Bali donor meeting is a key opportunity to press for those kinds of steps."