Kate Corbett, Canberra – An Australian businessman has funnelled thousands of dollars into a TV advertising campaign attacking Prime Minister John Howard accusing him of ignoring human rights abuses in Papua.
This is the second commercial funded by optical store millionaire Ian Melrose on the plight of Papuans. His first was released last month.
The new ad, airing for the first time today, calls for the new Australia-Indonesia security treaty to be amended to ensure human rights are monitored and foreign journalists allowed into Papua. It will initially be aired across Australia and then overseas on ABC Asia-Pacific and potentially on Indonesian television.
Mr Melrose launched the commercial at Parliament House in Canberra today, joined by a number of politicians. Independent MP Peter Andren said it was evident that Australia had ignored the situation in Papua for far too long.
"We realise there's been a secrecy and suppression around what's been occurring in West Papua for many, many years," Mr Andren told reporters.
The Australian government has signed the security treaty with Indonesia, but the treaty has not yet been ratified and is currently before a parliamentary inquiry.
The Australian Greens senator Kerry Nettle said the government had not involved the public on the treaty until the current inquiry started. She said Australians now had a chance to have a say, but must do so within the next week.
"It's an opportunity for people to say we want our human rights and the human rights of the West Papuans and of others in Indonesia put in the forefront of this treaty," Senator Nettle said.
Labor's Duncan Kerr and the Australian Democrats' Natasha Stott Despoja were also at the launch today and said they were united on the issue of human rights.
The politicians also heard from two Papuans and one woman from East Timor, who spoke of the hostility of the Indonesian security forces.
"I have seen with my own eyes how they shoot my people down when they try to do things differently, to stand for their rights," human rights worker Paula Makabory said. East Timorese asylum seeker Sonia Vitro told how the Indonesian military had killed her father.
Mr Melrose said he was determined to alert Australians to the plight of Papuans and is not concerned about the cost of the campaign.
But the successful businessman would not say how much he had spent. "That's not appropriate," he told reporters.