Newly declassified documents reveal the US government supported Indonesia's brutal takeover of West Papua despite overwhelming Papuan opposition and United Nations' requirement for genuine self-determination. Not surprisingly, the documents also show former US national security advisor Henry Kissinger played a key role in Washington’s ultimate decision to ignore the fact that West Papua’s 1969 “act of free choice” was a sham. Kissinger has profited handsomely from his support for the takeover, becoming a director of New Orleans-based Freeport-McMoRan Copper and Gold, which operates the world’s biggest gold mine in West Papua.

He reportedly received well over $500,000 a year just for sitting on the Freeport board of directors from 1995-2001. He remains on the board to this day, now holding the position of ‘director emeritus’. He has also been a major stockholder in Freeport and his “consulting” firm Kissinger Associates reportedly makes $300,000-$500,000 a year for acting as the company’s advisor.

Laksamana.Net - July 10, 2004 10:05 PM,
http://www.laksamana.net/vnews.cfm?ncat=29&news_id=7244

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Washington D.C., July 9, 2004 - "You should tell [Suharto] that we understand the problems they face in West Irian," national security adviser Henry Kissinger wrote President Nixon on the eve of Nixon's July 1969 visit to Indonesia according to previously secret documents posted today by the National Security Archive. The presidential trip coincided with Indonesia's holding of the "Act of Free Choice" voting by which it legitimized its annexation of the territory of West Irian (now known as West Papua).

Marking the 35th anniversary of the "Act of Free Choice" and in the midst of Indonesia's first direct presidential elections, the National Security Archive posted formerly secret documents detailing U.S. support for Indonesia's controversial 1969 takeover of the West Papua.

These documents were recently declassified by the State Department and the Richard Nixon Presidential Materials collection at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). This briefing book is the first publication of the National Security Archive's Indonesia documentation project, which is seeking the release of thousands of secret U.S. documents concerning U.S. policy toward Indonesia and East Timor from 1965-1999. The project aims to assist efforts to document and seek accountability for more than three decades of human rights abuses committed during the rule of Indonesian President Suharto (1965-1998).

Among the revelations in these formerly secret documents:

* Agreement among U.S. and other Western officials that "Indonesia could not win an open election" and that the vast majority of West Irian's inhabitants favored independence.

* U.S. officials attempted to convince the United Nations representative for the "Act of Free Choice," Bolivian diplomat Ortiz Sanz, that independence for West Irian was "inconceivable."

* U.S. Ambassador to Indonesia Frank Galbraith warned that Indonesian military operations and abuses in West Irian, resulting in the deaths of possibly hundreds of civilians "had stimulated fears and rumours of intended genocide among the Irianese."

http://www.nsarchive.org