We received information from Jayapura on Sat, 20 Oct 2007 that a West Papuan lawyer Sabar Iwanggin has been arrested in Jayapura and was being interrogated by personnel from the Detachment 88 the special police anti terrorist force.

Human Rights workers in Jayapura are unsure what the point of the case against Sabar Iwanggin. He is said to be charged with spreading SMS messages which are insulting to the Indonesian President because they say that the President 'wants to kill Papuans'.

Sabar Iwanggin is said by these Human Rights sources to have only received this SMS message and did not send the message.

The Human Rights workers report that this message about the Indonesian President has been spread around Papua since July 2007 and that thousands of people in Papua have received the same message. Human Rights workers said that the case against Mr Iwanggin appears to be based on the Police recording his mobile phone messages.

The Human Rights workers report the involvement of the Detachment '88 from Indonesian Police Headquarters in arrest and interrogation of Sabar Iwanggin.

This Special Detachment 88 is the anti-terrorist and was trained and funded by both Australian and US Governments. It was set up to fight terrorism in Indonesian after the Bali bombings and other incidents of terrorism. The impetus for international support and seemingly the name of the Detachment came after 88 Australians were killed in the Bali bomb blast Christmas 2000.

The Human Rights workers ask why Detachment 88 should be involved in this law process and why they have arrested of Sabar Iwanggin who is a civilian lawyer who has acted on Human rights cases. Sabar Iwanggin did act as one of the lawyers for student tried after the violent Abepura demonstrations of March 16, 2006.

Human Rights workers in Jayapura said yesterday that Sabar Iwanggin was held at POLDA Jayapura and was to be sent to Jakarta soon.