Crossing the Border: West Papuan Refugees and Self-Determination of Peoples

By Alan E. D. Smith

The West Papuan claim to the right of self-determination was denied by a series of political acts by the United States, the Netherlands, Indonesia and the United Nations, in the 1960s. The result was the spasmodic flight of thousands of refugees over the next two decades. Today, the task of containment of West Papuan discontent continues.
In a thesis divided into four distinct sections, Dr. Alan Smith presents enlightening insight into the 1984-85 refugee crisis; details Papua New Guinea’s responses to the crisis; focuses on the underlying causes of the refugee influx and the limited prospects for achieving a solution; and argues that solutions to problems stemming from the crisis require the development of an authoritative international procedure for treating frustrated self-determination claims. Finally, Dr. Smith shares his views on the UN’s involvement with the claims of indigenous peoples for self-determination and how it represents a unique opportunity for achievement.
Crossing the Border is a thesis that utilizes thorough research to examine both the West Papuans’ self-determination rights as well as their rights as refugees.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press AU
• Release date: Aug 30, 2021
• ISBN: 9781982291716

Alan E. D. Smith

Alan E. D. Smith was born in Perth, Australia, later migrated to Melbourne with his family, and eventually worked in Papua New Guinea, where he became engaged in the West Papua self-determination issue and was subsequently expelled. After earning a PhD from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, he worked in Thailand and Myanmar on political and social issues in Myanmar. Now retired, Dr. Smith lives in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

Book preview

Copyright © 2021 Alan E. D. Smith.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Balboa Press

A Division of Hay House

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.balboapress.com.au

AU TFN: 1 800 844 925 (Toll Free inside Australia)

AU Local: 0283 107 086 ([phone] from outside Australia)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

ISBN: 978-1-9822-9170-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-9171-6 (e)

Balboa Press rev. date:  08/30/2021

CONTENTS

Preface

Acknowledgements

Synopsis

Map 1. Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya/West Papua

Map 2. Language Groups of the Border Area

Map 3. The Border Region According to the Border Agreement

Map 4. Irian Jaya: Population Distribution

Map 5. Refugee Camp Locations

Introduction

Chapter 1 Self-Determination and the West New Guinea Dispute and its Settlement, 1945–69

1.1 The United Nations and Self-Determination of Peoples

1.2 The Origins of the West New Guinea Dispute

1.3 Political Development in West New Guinea

1.4 From the Luns Plan to the New York Agreement

1.5 From the New York Agreement to the Act of Free Choice

Chapter 2 West Papuan Nationalism: Responses Across the Border, 1962–69

2.1 West Papuan Resistance and the Emergence of the OPM

2.2 Refugees into Papua New Guinea: The Australian Response

2.3 Papua New Guinean Responses

Chapter 3 Managing the Border: From the Act of Free Choice to Papua New Guinea’s Independence, 1969–75

3.1 The Emergence of the OPM’s Border Focus

3.2 Australia Hands Over to Papua New Guinea

3.3 The New Guinea Border

3.4 Papua New Guinea’s Independence and the Border Agreement

Chapter 4 The Containment of West Papuan Nationalism, 1975–83

4.1 The OPM: Heightened Conflict and Aggravated Splits

4.2 Papua New Guinea–Indonesia Cooperation: 1975–80

4.3 The Chan Government and the Human Rights Tribunal, 1980–82

4.4 The 1982 Papua New Guinea Elections—The Okuk Line

4.5 1983: Continuing Papua New Guinea–Indonesia Tension

Chapter 5 The 1984 Refugee Influx: Policy Crisis for Papua New Guinea

5.1 Irian Jaya: Background to the Exodus

5.2 The Refugee Influx Begins: Refugees from Jayapura and the Bush

5.3 The Influx Continues: Refugees in the South

5.4 The Death of Arnold Ap and the Expulsion of the ABC

5.5 Starvation in the Western Province Camps

5.6 Argument about Repatriations: The Search for Safeguards

5.7 More Arguments about Repatriation and Port Moresby Retreats from Internationalisation

Chapter 6 1985 and Beyond: Wider Ripples from the Refugee Influx

6.1 The 1985 Crisis for the Somare Government: Enter the Melanesian Alliance

6.2 Refugees Remain in the Spotlight in Papua New Guinea

6.3 West Papuans Seek Refuge in Australia

6.4 Towards Relocation and Resettlement of Refugees in Papua New Guinea

6.5 The October 1985 Deportation: Papua New Guinea Policy Crisis

6.6 West Papuan Refugees and Australia–Papua New Guinea Relations: Hayden vs. Momis

6.7 Repatriation Gives Way to Resettlement

Chapter 7 The Causes of the 1984 Exodus: Dissatisfaction, Resistance, and Repression

7.1 Border Crossers or Refugees? Alternative Views of the Cause of the Exodus

7.2 Displacement and Dissatisfaction on the Irian Jaya Side of the Border

7.3 The Evidence from the Camps

7.4 The Cycle of Resistance and Repression

7.5 The Prospects: Reform and Resistance

Chapter 8 Papua New Guinea: Bilateralism and Internationalism

8.1 Bilateral and Trilateral Containment of West Papuan Nationalism

8.2 Papua New Guinea Internationalises the Refugee Situation

8.3 International Provisions for the Protection of Refugees

8.4 Making Internationalism More Realistic and Enhancing the Protection of Refugees

Chapter 9 Self-Determination: Indigenous Peoples and Sovereignty

9.1 New Developments Concerning Indigenous Peoples

9.2 The United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations

9.3 The Claim of Indigenous Peoples to the Right of Self-Determination

9.4 Australian Aborigines—The Demand for Sovereignty

9.5 The Question of Sovereignty of Indigenous Peoples

Chapter 10 Reconstructing Self-Determination

10.1 Towards an International Procedure and an Exploration of Forms

10.2 Relevant UN Agencies and Principles

10.3 Free Association: A Flexible Range of Forms

10.4 The Case of West Papua: Recapitulation and Afterword

References

PREFACE

In 1985, I was forced to leave Papua New Guinea because of my research activities in connection with West Papuan refugees. I returned to Australia and needed to earn a living, but I had full commitment to continuing to advocate on behalf of West Papuans. One immediate concern was to complete my library research into both the West Papuans’ self-determination rights as well as their rights as refugees. This resulted in a PhD dissertation completed in 1991. By chance in 1992, on the basis of my academic background, I was invited to a conference in Chiang Mai, Thailand, conducted on behalf of political opposition groups from Burma, ethnic people from the Burma border areas, and political exiles; they were focused on the idea of federalism as the solution. One way or another, for the next twenty-five years I found myself embedded in the politics of the ethnic people of Burma claiming the right of self-determination.

I retired to Australia in 2017 after twenty-five years in Thailand and Myanmar. After unpacking my books, I was brought face-to-face with my 1991 thesis, a dot matrix–printed bound copy, slightly flood damaged, but still legible. When I completed that thesis back in 1991 and sought to have it published so that it might be a useful piece of work, I was informed that there was little possibility because the readership for such work was so limited. So, there it sat on shelves in a small number of libraries, with no soft copy in existence. By coincidence, all these years later, there was news of yet another confrontation between West Papuan people and the Indonesian authorities. I was stricken with remorse at having allowed myself to be drawn away from continuing my advocacy on behalf of the rights of the West Papuans. I dedicated much of my first year in retirement to transcribing my dissertation so at least a soft copy existed. As I reread what I had written, I found that while much had changed, both with regard to self-determination issues and refugee issues, so much remained the same.

With a soft copy in my hands, I considered once again the idea of publishing. I was daunted by advice that I would need to update it. In the 1980s, Indonesia was still under military control. It was now a democratic country with substantial decentralisation including to the troubled West Papua. Self-determination in the international arena had also moved on, as the claim by indigenous peoples was finally internationally recognised. On the other hand, when I reread my 1991 account of the then hopeful political struggles by Australian Aborigines to finally achieve the proposed treaty of reconciliation, I had to conclude there were no significant breakthroughs. I hesitated, but updating the dissertation was swept aside when instead I returned to Thailand. Now, ethnic people in Myanmar were locked in a complex peace process designed to lead to a new democratic and federal Myanmar, with self-determination rights for ethnic people. In 2021, I was still in Thailand with no chance of travelling anywhere due to COVID-19, and with the Myanmar peace process suspended since the military takeover of February 1, finally I decided that before it was too late, I would publish that dissertation! Thanks to Balboa Press for making it possible.

Chiang Mai

May 2021

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The commencement of this study was largely due to the encouragement of Dr. Kevin Hewison. Its completion was due to the continuing interest, perseverance, and stimulation provided by my supervisor, Dr. Herbert Feith.

My family and friends have provided support and encouragement in many ways. Thanks are due to Ron and Barbara Hatley, Beverley Blaskett, Robin Osborne, and Betty Feith, who helped to keep me interested. Special thanks are due to Robin Osborne for his careful reading of an early draft and to Beverley Blaskett, who helped clarify the final draft. Special thanks also to my sister, Beverley Smith, who shared too many of the agonies of the last two years of the thesis being written and who supported me always unstintingly.

The thesis owes much to the students, colleagues, and friends in Papua New Guinea from whom I learned so much and from whom I so reluctantly parted in 1985.

Alan Smith

SYNOPSIS

The response of the Papua New Guinea government to the refugee influx of 1984 was conditioned by the Australian administration’s approach to border management prior to Papua New Guinea independence and by the Papua New Guinea–Indonesia border agreement. This approach is one of containment. It seeks to contain the activity and impact of West Papua nationalists.

The unprecedented scale of the refugee influx in 1984 caused a policy crisis for Papua New Guinea. Efforts to encourage refugees to return home met resistance from the refugees and caused public controversy. Efforts to negotiate safeguards for returning refugees, to secure international monitoring of repatriation, and to have Indonesia acknowledge the need to address West Papuan grievances created increased tension between Papua New Guinea and Indonesia. In 1985 when West Papuan refugees arrived in Australia for the first time, the Australian government demonstrated its continuing commitment to the policy of containment, which was reflected in its refusal to support Papua New Guinea’s attempts to internationalise the issue.

The policy of containment successfully prevents West Papuan nationalism from undermining good Indonesia–Australia relations.

Papua New Guinea, however, bears a significant political cost through continuing border incidents and tension in its relationship with Indonesia.

The refugee influx afforded Papua New Guinea a legitimate opportunity to press for the cause of the problem to be examined. But its attempts to do so were abandoned for want of international, and crucially Australian, support. A massive influx of refugees should automatically set in motion an international process to examine root causes of the influx to bring about the necessary conditions for voluntary repatriation.

The achievement of the changes in Irian Jaya necessary to resolve the conflict between West Papuan nationalists and the Indonesian state may depend on the creation of new international measures to address the whole class of frustrated claims to the right of self-determination.

During the decolonisation era, self-determination came to be equated with the process of dismantling European Empires to create new states out of colonial territories. States, old and new, rejecting secessionism, have rejected further application of the principle of self-determination of peoples. Reconstruction of the right of self-determination requires the nexus between self-determination and independence to be broken. What is needed is an authoritative international process through which self-determination claims can be assessed and a range of forms through which the aspirations they represent can be satisfied.

The current examination by the United Nations of the situation of indigenous peoples involves it in a new discourse concerning the right of self-determination. The demands by indigenous peoples are not usually for the formation of new states but are commonly for recognition of their sovereignty and recognition in international law. Free Association, formulated by the UN during the decolonisation period as an alternative to independence and integration into another state, remains an underexplored form through which new, internationally safeguarded relationships between sovereign peoples and sovereign states might be negotiated.

Map 1. Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya/West Papua

Map%201.jpg

Map 2. Language Groups of the Border Area

Map%202.jpg

Map 3. The Border Region According to the Border Agreement

map%203.jpg

Map 4. Irian Jaya: Population Distribution

Map%204.jpg

Map 5. Refugee Camp Locations

Map%205.jpg

INTRODUCTION

A number of combined factors get people on the move. Whether political or economic in nature, exodus could be prevented of circumscribed only if conditions were to be drastically different at the point of departure. To change these conditions would however appear to be a task of such challenging magnitude as to defy the competence and capability of any individual organ of the international community. It would require a global approach towards such problems as human rights, economic and social disparities, peace and security, food and population. Politics would have to take second place and governments might have to accept a more flexible interpretation of national sovereignty.

(Sadruddin Aga Khan, Study on Human Rights and Mass Exoduses, United Nations Economic and Social Council, Commission on Human Rights, 1981)

This study arose out of the flight in 1984 of more than ten thousand West Papuans from their homeland in what is officially the Indonesian province of Irian Jaya in search of refuge in neighbouring Papua New Guinea. (See Map 1) After 1962, when the former Dutch colony of Nieuw Guinea was transferred to Indonesian control, there were spasmodic flows of refugees across the border into what was, until 1975, the Australian-administered Territory of Papua New Guinea (TPNG), subsequently called the independent state of Papua New Guinea (PNG). As many as three thousand people fled during the years 1967–69 in the run-up to the Act of Free Choice, an often-criticised procedure by which Irian Barat (West Irian), as the Indonesians then called the former Dutch colony, was formally integrated into the Republic of Indonesia. Another two thousand crossed the border during 1977–78 when large-scale uprisings against Indonesian rule occurred in the interior of Irian Jaya.

The thesis consists of four somewhat distinct sections.

1. Chapters 1–4, in which the background to the 1984–85 refugee crisis is presented.

2. Chapters 5 and 6, in which the details of Papua New Guinea’s responses to the 1984–85 refugee crisis are discussed.

3. Chapters 7 and 8, which focus on the underlying causes of the refugee influx and the limited prospects for achieving a durable solution by way of reform measures initiated by Indonesia or as a result of pressure from Papua New Guinea.

4. Chapters 9 and 10, which argue (a) that the solutions of problems of the kind underlying the 1984–85 refugee influx require the construction of an authoritative international procedure for treating frustrated self-determination claims and (b) that the UN’s involvement with the claims of indigenous peoples for self-determination represents a unique opportunity for its achievement.

A more comprehensive outline of the chapters is contained in 1.2 below.

When the 1984 influx of refugees into Papua New Guinea occurred, I had just completed a year of teaching as visiting senior tutor in the Department of Political and Administrative Studies at the University of Papua New Guinea, a position I had taken on a short-term basis to teach a course on Indonesia. The much-publicised refugee influx and the growing tension between Papua New Guinea and Indonesia brought about by accompanying border incidents meant growing public debate in Papua New Guinea about how the government should respond to the situation. It meant that I was confronted by a barrage of questions from interested students. The questions were of two kinds. First, since the Organisasi Papua Merdeka (OPM), or the Free Papua Movement, which was the umbrella West Papuan nationalist movement, had often been pronounced dead by various Indonesian, Australian, and Papua New Guinean observers, what was the cause of this new and much larger exodus? Second, what choices were there for the Papua New Guinea government?

In what was intended as a short-term project undertaken jointly with Dr. Kevin Hewison, who was at that time teaching a course in Southeast Asian politics in the same department, I set out to try to find out who the refugees were, where they had come from, and what the causes of their immigration were. During the course of this investigation, there was obvious division in political circles and within the government itself as to how the refugees should be treated. The disagreement was manifest in the terms used to describe those who had crossed the border seeking refuge: border crossers or illegal border crossers by those favouring their speedy repatriation, and refugees by those supporting the provision of protection. The issue came to a head in August 1984 when it was publicly revealed that government refusal to allow supplies to be provided had caused death by starvation in remote border camps. This dramatic disclosure led the Papua New Guinea government to invite the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to supervise the provision of support for those in the camps, although these migrants were still not recognised by the Papua New Guinea government as refugees.

That initial joint project was wound up at the end of 1984 with the departure of Dr. Hewison from Papua New Guinea. The outcome was a joint paper concerning the refugee influx and the consequences for Papua New Guinea–Indonesia relations. This was published as 1984: The Year the OPM Pulled the Plug on Indonesia–PNG Relations (Smith and Hewison 1985) and, in an abbreviated, slightly revised form, as 1984: Refugees, ‘Holiday Camps’ and Deaths (Smith and Hewison 1986).

The answers that we put forward at that time to the two sets of questions referred to above were as follows: First, while most of the first few hundred people had fled from in and around Jayapura, the provincial capital, most of the rest were village people from the tribal groups whose traditional land lay in the border region or actually straddled the frontier. Second, while the status of the people who had sought refuge remained technically unresolved, many thousands of those who had crossed the border into Papua New Guinea appeared to us to have genuine reasons to seek refuge. The refusal by the Papua New Guinea government to formally acknowledge this seriously limited its options in dealing with the problem.

To argue for the recognition and protection of the asylum seekers as refugees was to reject the proposition put forward by the Indonesian government that the problem was one which should not be internationalised but must be solved through bilateral action. This latter view was supported by many in Papua New Guinea government circles, reflecting the view that Papua New Guinea’s security required, above all, the pursuit of good relations with its giant western neighbour. They argued that the problem should be resolved through the Border Agreement, which by coincidence was being reviewed during the course of 1984.

The issue was still thoroughly alive at the end of 1984, exemplified by the arrival in late November of hundreds more refugees, continuing negotiation by Papua New Guinea’s foreign minister, Rabbie Namliu, for the involvement of the UNHCR in any refugee repatriation, followed shortly afterwards by the replacement of the foreign minister and the sudden repatriation of a hundred refugees without UNHCR participation. My stay in Papua New Guinea had been extended—in mid-1984, I had transferred to the Department of Extension Studies at the university—so I set out to formally extend my research, applying for acceptance as a master of arts candidate within the University of Papua New Guinea.

Much of the structure of the present thesis reflects my major concern at that time. I wanted to demonstrate that there was not necessarily a contradiction between Papua New Guinea’s protection of the rights of refugees and its own security. I intended to demonstrate that the bilateralist approach was an extension of earlier (and continuing) Australian policy and was based on a false assumption: that through Papua New Guinea’s continued cooperation with Indonesia, public discouragement of West Papuan aspirations, and careful border management, the bid by West Papuan nationalists for self-determination and a separate state of West Papua would die away.

My intention was to suggest that such an approach would lead to the perpetuation of recurring trouble at the border and that it was in Papua New Guinea’s strategic interest to grapple with the problem at its source. While the bilateral approach was to manage the problem through containment of West Papuan nationalism, I set out to argue that the problem could only be eliminated through the satisfaction of West Papuan aspirations. My intention was to argue that Papua New Guinea should break out of the policy straitjacket imposed by Indonesia and Australia and take the initiative to internationalise the issue, and that the obligation to protect refugees provided a legitimate opportunity to do so.

The bilateralist approach is reflected in the 1974 Border Agreement, concluded prior to Papua New Guinea’s independence between Indonesia and what was referred to as Australia acting on behalf of the future independent Papua New Guinea. The Border Agreement was renewed with minor amendment by Indonesia and Papua New Guinea in 1979 and again in 1984. It recognises certain border-crossing rights of the people who inhabit the border region and whose traditional tribal territory in many cases straddles the border. The problem for Papua New Guinea arises because many of the border people from inside Irian Jaya reject Indonesian rule and enjoy the sympathy of border people, often from the same tribes, from inside Papua New Guinea. The Border Agreement requires Papua New Guinea to deny the use of its territory to West Papuan nationalist forces.

The Border Agreement contains no reference to refugees, but it does call for both governments, in administering movements across the border, to bear in mind relevant principles of international law and practice.

This became a second focus of my extended study. Precisely what were the relevant principles of international law and practice regarding the protection of refugees? I was looking to discover to what degree the argument could be sustained that the government of Papua New Guinea was bound to provide protection according to international standards.

The concept of international protection of refugees is of long standing and reasonably well codified by the United Nations. International law concerning refugees seeks to do four things:

i. to define who must be protected as a refugee,

ii. to establish what the rights of refugees are,

iii. to prescribe procedures through which refugees are provided with protection by host states, and

iv. to provide a basis in international law for the protection of refugees so as to remove refugee protection from the complexities of bilateral relations between states.

In 1984 neither Indonesia nor Papua New Guinea were signatories to the international treaties concerning refugees, and it is problematic what are obligations of nonsignatory states. (Papua New Guinea, after a change of government at the end of 1985, did accede to these treaties.) Crucially, international law leaves to host states the right to evaluate claims to asylum and to determine whether a person seeking refuge is granted refugee status and consequently covered by the international provisions for protection. The United Nations’ own specialist body, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, recommends to states that in cases of large-scale influx, refuge seekers should be treated as prima facie refugees. However, the UNHCR can provide protection and care only when a state has provided asylum. The UNHCR also recommends to states that durable solutions be sought and that

The causes leading to large scale influxes of asylum seekers are as far as possible removed and, where such influxes have occurred, that conditions favourable to voluntary repatriation are established. (UNHCR 1981)

At the end of 1984, following my initial investigation, Hewison and I had considered a range of explanations for the sudden mass exodus and referred to the accounts given by refugees. Our conclusion then was that one or a combination of the following had occurred.

a. A number of incidents had occurred and people had reason to fear reprisals from the Indonesian authorities.

b. A story emanating from the OPM had been effectively spread and triggered off a mass exodus.

c. The OPM had one way or another carried out a very effective mobilization. (Smith and Hewison 1985, 103)

In early 1985, while making a follow-up visit to the border region, I had the opportunity to meet and talk with Gerard Thomy, the leader of the OPM for the southern part of the border region, the region encompassing the area from which the major part of the refugees had fled. My meeting with Thomy left me with a lasting impression. As I wrote at that time,

[the OPM] leaders remain so totally confident of the obviousness of the injustice done to the Irian Jayan people that they believe somewhere in the world there must be some official body which will recognize their case and have the power to rectify it. (Smith 1985a)

This meeting had the indirect effect of extending the scope of my study. Upon returning from that meeting, I was made aware of the very strong disapproval of the Papua New Guinea authorities, who made representations to the University of Papua New Guinea. At the end of June 1985, when my six-month contract at the university expired, I found that I had failed to gain reappointment and was given five days to leave the country.

I returned to Australia just at the time of the arrival on Australian territory in the Torres Strait of five West Papuans seeking refuge in Australia, an event that generated obvious alarm in the Australian government. A handful of West Papuan refugees was apparently perceived as so likely to disturb Australia’s relations with Indonesia that it was eventually decided that as a deterrent, no person arriving in Australia as a point of first refuge from a neighbouring country would be granted permanent refuge. I argued at that time that

The whole point of the international conventions is to remove the treatment of refugees from the political arena so that their humane treatment is not constrained by fears of political repercussions. Many West Papuans are in need of refuge. Australia must show that it accepts its obligation to assist refugees wherever they come from, and it should urge its neighbours too, to accede to the conventions and to depoliticize the treatment of refugees. (Smith 1985b)

The problematic situation of West Papuan asylum seekers in Australia (a country priding itself on its record regarding acceptance of refugees) shaped my thinking at the time that I was recommencing my study, this time enrolled at Monash University. I set out to further examine the obligations of host countries under international law as well as to consider the continuing influence of the Australian government over the formulation of policy in Papua New Guinea regarding West Papuan refugees.

While the concept of international protection of refugees is long standing, reasonably well codified, and designed to free the provision of protection from political implications, actual practice clearly reflects the political priorities of host states. The difference between convention and actual practice may be due to two issues. First, the host state’s acceptance of the refugee status of refuge seekers may threaten its friendly relations with the state of origin. Second, to accept a universal obligation to refuge seekers may threaten the host state’s control over its frontiers and immigration.

I had become aware of the weakness of international convention provisions as a standpoint for criticising both Papua New Guinea’s and Australia’s treatment of refugees at their frontiers. The obligation of host states to provide protection to persons who have entered the country legally and have cause to ask for refuge is clear. But the situation of persons without entry permits arriving at a frontier seeking refuge is not. Rejection at the frontier, while clearly against the spirit of the provisions for international protection, is frequently practiced and, even for signatories of the International Refugee Convention, does not clearly contravene international law.

One particular observation helped me to make sense of state practice. Hathaway (1985) challenges the assumed humanitarian or human rights foundations of international refugee law. He argues,

The true premise of refugee law is the need to permit states to respond selectively to the needs of a very narrowly defined group of persons whose existence could, if ignored, jeopardise the continued ability of states to exercise control over immigration.

Hathaway’s formulation may cast in an unduly cynical light the motives of individual initiators of the international refugee conventions, but I found it a useful interpretation of the shape of the international provisions that states were prepared to agree to and a useful insight into the response of host states to refugees. When it comes to the protection of rights, states protect their own rights first.

This realisation provided me with new insight into the apparent miscarriage of justice that had been allowed by the international community to occur regarding West Papuan self-determination. I had been struck time and again by the strength of the belief expressed by West Papuan nationalists and refugees that their primary struggle was to demonstrate to an unknowing world that a miscarriage of justice had taken place. Hence the determination of Gerard Thomy, for example, to communicate with regional and UN leaders and draw attention to the West Papuan case, assuming that once the injustice was recognised, an appropriate existing mechanism would be put into operation for its correction.

The historical process of decolonisation since World War II and the 1960 Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples has led to widespread popular belief in a right or law of self-determination. Any reading of recent history, however, quickly demonstrates that such claims have been conceded in only an extremely limited range of cases. It can be argued that the community of states has been prepared to acknowledge the principle of self-determination but, is highly selectively, in cases where the principle of the territorial integrity of existing states is not called into question.

With regard to the 1984 refugee influx into Papua New Guinea, I identified in government circles two contending views about how the government should respond, one more bilateralist and the other more internationalist. The former placed greater importance on minimising the damage that the situation was causing to Papua New Guinea–Indonesia relations. The latter favoured bringing international attention to bear on the refugee situation and the underlying causes of the influx.

Bilateralist opposition to the internationalist response was based on fear that calling into play international refugee protection procedures would damage Papua New Guinea’s relations with Indonesia. The internationalist approach, which I supported, favoured the provision of proper protection of refugees and saw it as serving Papua New Guinea’s longer term interests, although it may, in the short term, antagonise Indonesia. From both angles, the application of international protection provisions for refugees, including examination of underlying causes, involved political risks to Papua New Guinea as a host state.

After study of Papua New Guinea’s response to the 1984 refugee influx, I concluded that if the rights of refugees were to be effectively upheld, the political cost to states taking action in the international arena on behalf of refugees needed to be lessened, and international refugee protection procedures should cause the political burden to be shared. If that was done, it would make it far more likely that underlying causes would be identified and effective pressure brought to bear on the state of origin to bring about remedial action.

Late in 1986, I presented a seminar in the Monash Department of Politics that led to my candidacy being upgraded to doctoral level and to an expansion in the scope of my study. The focus was extended to include consideration of the form that remedial action might take in the case of Irian Jaya. In the last four chapters of the thesis, I argue the following.

a. Without a regime change in Jakarta, there is little likelihood of the necessary remedial action being taken by Indonesia to end a cycle of dissatisfaction, resistance, and repression, which was the background to the 1984 exodus from Irian Jaya.

b. While there were elements of Papua New Guinea’s response to the 1984 refugee influx, which were directed towards bringing international pressure to bear on Indonesia with regard to the underlying causes, these were abandoned for lack of international, and crucially Australian, support.

c. There is a need for an authoritative international procedure to which self-determination claims can be referred.

d. The seeds of such a procedure may lie in an emerging new discourse on self-determination for indigenous peoples.

My consciousness of an emerging new discourse on self-determination reflects the environment in Australia at the time of the 1988 bicentennial celebrations and its heightened debate concerning relations between Aboriginal and settler communities in Australia. While the West Papuan claim to self-determination arises from decolonisation, the United Nations has been actively involved in this new discourse concerning self-determination through its examination of the situation and rights of indigenous peoples. It is argued in the final two chapters that this discourse, illustrated by reference to the Australian case, represents an opportunity to bring about a reconstruction of UN practise regarding self-determination.

Some important limitations on the discussion in the thesis should be noted with regard to the refugee influx of 1984–85, the situation in Irian Jaya, and the issue of self-determination. The thesis does not attempt to detail all aspects of the political context of Papua New Guinea in 1984–85 but seeks to provide a commentary on the main events surrounding Papua New Guinea’s policy responses. The thesis also does not survey in detail Papua New Guinea–Indonesia relations or all aspects of Papua New Guinea–Indonesia border management. Nor does it include an examination of Indonesian responses to the refugee crisis, although Indonesian pressure on Papua New Guinea is acknowledged as an important element in determining Papua New Guinea’s responses. Similarly, the thesis does not present a comprehensive survey of conditions in Irian or a definitive account of West Papuan nationalism.

The thesis draws on a number of commentaries on Papua New Guinea–Indonesia relations and the key related issue of West Papuan nationalism. It seeks to reconstruct from them how Papua New Guinea was constrained to respond to the refugee influx to satisfy Indonesia and Australia rather than to fulfil its obligations to the refugees and the international community and pursue its own long-term interest in resolving the underlying conflict in Irian Jaya. June Verrier’s thesis, Australia Papua New Guinea and the West New Guinea Question, 1949–1969 (1976), is the essential source of information regarding the Australian administration of the border and West Papuan refugees in the 1962–69 period. The collection of papers edited by R.J. May, The Indonesia-Papua New Guinea Border: Irianese Nationalism and Small State Diplomacy (1979), brings together material concerning Papua New Guinea’s management of its relations with Indonesia in the years immediately following its independence.

Blaskett’s study, "Papua New Guinea-Indonesia Relations: A