Amnesty International calls on the Indonesian authorities to end arbitrary arrests of Papuan political activists solely for exercising their rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and expression in the country’s Papua region. Anyone who remains detained solely for the peaceful exercise of their human rights must be immediately and unconditionally released. Hundreds of Papuan activists, mostly members and supporters of the West Papua National Committee (Komite Nasional Papua Barat, KNPB), were arrested after the organization called for a series of peaceful demonstrations. These demonstrations were held in May 2015, in support of an application by a Papuan pro-independence umbrella group, the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP), to join the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG), a sub-Pacific intergovernmental organization.
