Vaudine England, Jakarta – Lost in the recent hoopla of Parliament's approval of special autonomy for Irian Jaya is the fact that four of the separatist-inclined province's leaders remain on trial for subversion.

According to the top legislator in Irian Jaya – which is also known as Papua – the four face conviction and further imprisonment for advocating what Parliament has just made legal. "I call on the panel of justices to drop the subversion charges and free the four suspects because they, along with the Papuan people, have been accommodated by the special autonomy law," said John Ibo, chairman of the Irian Jaya provincial legislative council.

Irian Jaya's new autonomy law, passed last month, promises 70 to 80 per cent of natural resource revenues to the province rather than Jakarta, and allows Papuans to fly their own flag as a cultural symbol. The provincial governor will be Papuan and can choose his own police chief. A new Papua People's Council, comprising indigenous Papuans, will protect the rights of locals based on customary laws and rituals.

But speaking out about the merits of independence versus autonomy, as the four Papuan leaders are accused of doing, apparently remains out of bounds.

The Papua Presidium, a pro-independence body set up in the middle of last year to give Jakarta a body to negotiate with, is chaired by former Golkar legislator and local tribal leader Theys Eluay. He and his colleagues in the Presidium – secretary-general Thaha Al-Hamid, youth chairman Don Flassy and the Reverend Hermon Awom – were arrested and charged with subversion for organising a pro-independence congress in the provincial capital Jayapura last year.

The congress was partly funded by the then president, Abdurrahman Wahid, but he has refused to testify on the Papuans' behalf. Several of the ways used to protest that led to the crackdown last December are now legal. This includes flying the Papuan flag and changing the province's name to Papua.

But efforts at a fair trial for the four are being stymied, local human rights activists say, as prosecutors refuse to consider dropping the charges, even preventing some expert witnesses from assisting the court. At the same time, security forces have continued to clash with independence activists, some of whom say special autonomy is not enough.