FBI helps Indonesian police in Papua Indonesia

The FBI (US Federal Bureau of Investigation) has helped Indonesian police capture suspects in the slaying of American schoolteachers in 2002.

A US grand jury already indicted Anthonius Wamang, a Papuan separatist fighter, for the murders. Papua is the far west of the country, the island split between West Papua (Irian Jaya) and PNG (Papua New Guinea). Western companies have been mining there are many years. Errol Flynn mined for gold in PNG, and the relationship between local tribes and money hungry western companies has never been good.

West Papua has been fighting a guerilla war for years and the shooting of the schoolteachers was an accident. The FBI pulled a fast one though, telling the suspects they would be flwon to the US and recieve fair trial. Instead they were put in a truck and handed over to the Indonesian police, who promise to prosecute them.

In the US the cops often pull the old ‘bait and switch’ telling people over the radio they have won a prize and when they show up at the place to collect it, they are arrested.