Tb. Arie Rukmantara, Jakarta – Indonesian environmentalists plan to discuss pollution and rights abuse by multinational companies during the upcoming UN Human Rights Commission meetings in Geneva.
Activists grouped in the Indonesian Forum for the Environment are dismayed by what they perceive as the government's failure to properly address the problems, which mainly affect local communities. The 62nd session of the UN Human Rights Commission will take place from March 27 to April 8.
The forum's deputy director Ridho Saleh told The Jakarta Post over the weekend that the Indonesian NGOs planned to discuss how law enforcement had been lacking as far as pollution by multinational companies was concerned.
Among the issues to be raised is the government's failure to properly addressed pollution by PT Freeport Indonesia in Papua and PT Newmont Minahasa Raya in North Sulawesi.
Ridho said he would push the commission to produce a resolution obliging multinational companies to protect the environment and the people living near their operation areas.
"We will demand that the commission force companies to apply protection of these rights by revising the commission's 'norms of corporations and other enterprises', which presently does not include these conditions," he said, in reference to the 2003 UN document entitled Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations and other Business Enterprises with Regard to Human Rights.
Rich in natural resources, Indonesia has recently experienced heightened tension with giant multinational companies that extract the country's oil, gas and mineral resources.
Environmentalists have blamed some of the companies for the pollution of the environment, as well as a lack of concern for the people living near their operation areas – specifically mining companies, such as Freeport and Newmont and their tailings disposal.
In addition, Exxon Mobile Corp.'s operation in Aceh drew criticism this past week for allegedly violating human rights of villagers near a major gas field in the province. A US District Judge, Louis Oberdorfer, granted a lawsuit by Washington-based advocacy group International Labor Rights Fund to sue the oil giant over the rape and torture of local Acehnese, allegedly perpetrated by Indonesian Military troops guarding the company's facilities.
All these companies have denied the allegations against them, saying that they have abided by Indonesian regulations on the environment and have not caused pollution nor contributed to human rights abuses.
Ridho said the Indonesian delegates to Geneva, consisting of activists from 15 human rights groups, would also call for the commission to raise the issue in the upcoming General Assembly meeting.