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Indigenous women play vital roles in ensuring the continuous existence of indigenous peoples, cultures, and biodiversity. They are the main food producers in subsistence economies which persist in Papuan communities in West Papua, despite the efforts of external influences to disrupt these communities.
Papuan women are capable resource managers and protectors of the environment. The maintenance of environmental integrity is directly proportional to their effectiveness as producers and reproducers.

In spite of such crucial roles, they remain as one of the most marginalized, discriminated-against and oppressed sections of society. They are in the margins as far as decision-making is concerned. Papuan women suffer a big disadvantage because most of them have not had, or were not part of, organisations which articulated and addressed their concerns in a proper manner: there are signs this is changing with the formation for example of Papuan Women’s Solidarity (Solidaritas Perempuan Papua) in July 2001, and the leadership provided by such women as Yosepha Alomang. There is also a high rate of illiteracy among women.

Papuan women have become part of the Indonesian population control program. The effects the population control program have on women’s health are not sufficiently met by the Indonesian government, and the right of women to control their own bodies has not been acknowledged. The use of injectibles and long-term contraceptives such as Norplant contains severe health hazards for women in West Papua. Often medical staff do not have proper knowledge of removing the Norplant tubes, although Norplant should not remain in a woman’s body longer than 5 years. Women have themselves over the years developed ways of natural birth-control, based on their knowledge of indigenous plants and customs, in tune with the needs of the community.

While the increased presence of military machinery and personnel has severe consequences for Papuan indigenous communities as a whole, the consequences for women take multiple forms. Not only as caretakers, producers and reproducers of the community are they under severe attack, as women they experience an increase in rapes. Women and girls have become victims of rapings. These violent attacks, conducted by the military, have taken place in several areas. Young school girls, as young as five years old, have been picked up from schools by military personnel; their teachers are powerless to protect them, their parents are often unaware. As far as is known, no rape case against an Indonesian soldier has ever been successfully prosecuted. When parents file official complaints, they are often threatened by the authorities.

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