[?]elanesia

[?]ith Asian [?]avour

rom a Port Moresby correspondent Jevelopment in Indonesian Irian a has speeded up, after a number years of neglect following the tch withdrawal in 1962. There e been considerable improvements communications and transport, lough village economies have been ;n little assistance. ►apua New Guinea observers who e visited the Indonesian province mdy (it was formerly West Irian), art favourably on the new de >pments.

"he central Indonesian government spending more money in the pro ce, mainly because there is tre ndous potential there in minerals [ petroleum. Revenue from these Id possibly wipe out the current 30 million annual subsidies being d from external sources, t is most noticeable, however, that new developments are centring und the towns, especially Manok -i, Sorong and Jayapura, and that town populations are to a large ent composed of immigrants from er parts of Indonesia. Only a ill proportion of Irianese live in m and prosper from income levels ich now are often higher than in st other Indonesian provinces, dining ventures will continue to ig in Indonesians from other as, particularly from Java, and so elop Indonesian towns in Irian a, rather than Melanesian towns, fhe Indonesians see nothing in igruous about this—nor in the fact t fewer Irianese now have top s than when the Dutch were in itrol —because they don’t agree re is any “localisation” problem h as Papua New Guinea has. mese are Indonesians like every ly else and are entitled to no cial concessions. fhe observers say that this attitude the Indonesians has helped create greater feeling of unity in the r ns, although it is unlikely there e been any changes at the village ;1 because of the comparative lack development there. In the towns ny aspects of Indonesian culture e been absorbed by the Irianese, life goes on as before in the ages.

Jndoubtedly there is still resent nt against the Indonesians in some as—often simply local resentment 1 uneasiness that things aren’t

going as well as they might—but the observers believe that reports of re volt being stirred by Free Papua Movement supporters have been greatly exaggerated.

There is no evidence of any wide spread anti - Indonesian nationalist movement, and the number of armed dissidents is probably only a few hundred. With such a small and un organised group it is unlikely that the anti-Indonesian feeling held by refugees in Papua New Guinea can be whipped into a state which could threaten unity between Papua New Guinea and Irian Jay a following PNG’s independence.

Meanwhile talks on demarcation of the border between PNG and Irian Jaya have been completed and Chief Minister Somare will sign an agree ment in Djakarta in November on behalf of the Australian Government.