THOUSANDS of West Papuans have been forcibly displaced from their homes by Indonesian military operations in an attempt to plunder the region’s natural resources, independence leaders claimed today.

Leader of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) Benny Wenda said he was saddened to hear that 2,400 civilians have been forced from their land in 19 villages in the Maybrat region.

“Maybrat is a peaceful place. The violence we are seeing now is a result of Indonesian state attempts to clear the local people and grab the gold and minerals that lie under the earth,” he said.

“I have been stating for a long time that Indonesia’s military operations are not about ‘sovereignty,’ but business,” Mr Wenda added.

He accused the Indonesian army, government officials and intelligence services of links to global mining projects that seek to establish extraction projects on West Papuan land.

“The military operations are attempts to wipe out entire villages and clear the way for illegal mines. 

“They are killing us because we are black, because we are different. This is state-sponsored terrorism,” the independence leader said.

West Papua was formally annexed by Indonesia via the 1969 Act of Free Choice which was ratified by the votes of just 1,000 locals, many doing so at gunpoint.

Since then about 500,000 West Papuans have been killed in a struggle for self-determination.

The region’s population lives in extreme poverty despite it being home to the Grasberg mine, one of the world’s largest gold mines.

Mr Wenda, like others in West Papua, fear that the population may be wiped out as more land is appropriated by the Indonesian state on behalf of the mining projects.

He insists that Indonesia’s military operations and occupation of West Papuan land is “illegal” and says that the only solution to the unrest is a referendum on independence.