Indonesia

Indonesia has great natural wealth but many of its citizens live in extreme poverty. Democratic progress has been made since the resigation of former president Suharto in 1998, but many civil society organisations feel that far too little progress has been made towards sustainable management of the country's resources, and ensuring that Indonesia's diverse communities have a real say in decisions which affect their future.

DTE 93-94, December 2012

By Noer Fauzi Rachman*

The systemic agrarian conflicts referred to in this article are protracted conflicts arising from opposing claims made on particular pieces of land, or over natural resources and community-owned areas or territories, by giant corporations in the business of infrastructure, production, resource extraction and conservation, and where each opposing side is taking direct or indirect action to negate the claim of the other.

DTE 93-94, December 2012

Last year DTE reported on the global land-grab phenomenon and its connection to the 2008 financial crisis, the global food price spike of 2007/2008 as well as the ongoing climate change & energy crisis.[1] Since then, more analysis of data on land deals has become available which fills in some of the detail in the picture. In this update, we take another look at the global rush for land with a focus on investors and their obligations to the people affected by land-grabbing.

DTE 93-94, December 2012

Plantation and mining companies should be held responsible for human rights abuses - HR Commission

DTE 91-92, May 2012

The Fourth Congress of the Indigenous Peoples of the Archipelago (KMAN IV) celebrated the achievements of the past five years. But there is still much more to be done to secure indigenous communities’ rights to lands and resources.

DTE 91-92, May 2012

A new report makes clear the links between natural resources extraction and violence against Papuan women. Enough is Enough! is the result of an initiative begun in 2009, to document incidences of violence and human rights abuses against women in Papua over the past four decades.

DTE 91-92, May 2012

In our special edition newsletter on Papua published in November 2011, DTE drew attention to the long and sorry history of top-down resource exploitation in Papua. Now, a whole raft of new development plans are being pushed through, under the government’s nation-wide effort to speed up development (MP3EI), launched last year. An additional layer of plans specifically for Papua is being promoted by UP4B, a special unit to speed up development in Papua.

DTE 89-90, November 2011, Special Papua edition

The brutal crackdown by Indonesian security forces on the Third Papuan Congress in October has brought up to six deaths and hundreds of beatings and arrests.