And again, it's about human rights violations... Last time I called out "Shame on you!", it was the denial of ratification of an international treaty to protect indigenous people's rights for reasons of protecting potential investors' interests in so-called "developing countries" (mostly the living space of what "civilized" people refer to as "primitive natives").
This time, it's again about putting profits first, since Germany just has to stay on top of the nations with the best turnover from exporting goods and services. And we're talking about very good and trusty German high-tech, which has been exported many times to the satisfaction of our customers... Weapons!
The German federal government plans to sell (at least) 130 tanks to Indonesia. That deal would also include fully-equipped battle tanks, such as the Leopard II.
Our German arms industry has already been a supplier of high-tech to Indonesian troops, such as elite forces using the Heckler & Koch MP 5, as can be seen in this picture of president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (commonly abbreviated SBY in the media for sakes of easier typing and pronunciation) inspecting his troops:
Troops such as these are often sent into provinces under Indonesian occupation, such as East Timor and West Papua to harrass, maim and kill the non-Indonesian population there. In West Papua, at least 300,000 people have been killed, since Indonesia invaded that part of New Guinea. And German arms. sold to that country for sakes of profit, helped in doing so.
Being German, I feel like I can't eat as much as I'd like to puke about that.
By the way, German people might have heard of the province of West Papua (called "Irin Jaya" in the native Papuan language), since Sabine Kuegler, the "Jungle Child", grew up there, living in the woods with her parents who were researching about groups of Fayu natives. She has revisited the place where she grew up and has become aware of the human rights violations and helped in making them known to the general public in her second book entitled "Ruf des Dschungels" ("Call of the Jungle").
In order to prevent tanks being sold to a known criminal, there is an online petition on avaaz.org to be sent to Frau Merkel and Herr Westerwelle (Federal German secretary of state), urging them not to make a deal with SBY. "Known criminal??" you might ask? Yes, indeed... SBY is sought with an international arrest warrant for genocide...
Only last week, he visited Britain and was invited by prime minister Cameron and the royal family... needless to say that the British officials did not have the guts to arrest him.
Indonesian media are successfully blocking and censoring news and media reports on what is happening in West Papua. However, there are independent resources, such as this Facebook group:
http://www.facebook.com/freewestpapua
Sometimes, there are good things to be found on Facebook, too.
The aforementioned online petition can be found here:
http://petition.avaaz.org/en/petition/Dont_give_permission_to_sell_tanks_to_Indonesia/
Needless to say, I already signed it.
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