Pacific Island civil society says the Pacific Island Forum leaders must support Vanuatu's effort to take the issue of West Papua to the UN.
Since the latter part of 2017, fighters with the West Papuan Liberation Army, or TPN, have intensified hostilities with Indonesia's military and police in Tembagapura and its surrounding region in Papua's Highlands. Photo: RNZ / Suara Wiyaima
The executive director of the civil society umbrella group, PIANGO, or the Pacific Islands Association of Non Government Organisations, Emele Duituturaga, said they continue to be concerned with ongoing human rights violations in Indonesia's Papuan provinces.
Ms Duituturaga said the issue of West Papua has been on the leaders agenda for decades without evident progress.
She said PIANGO had raised its concerns over the last two years, but nothing had changed.
Her organisation has called for a UN Special Rapporteur on West Papua to investigate continued human rights violations; support for a UN General Assembly Resolution to include West Papua on the UN Decolonisation List; and scrutiny of development co-operation with Indonesia and participation in the Pacific Island Forum.
Selected people representing civil society will meet with Pacific leaders next week at the leaders' summit in Nauru.