West New Guinea

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29767, 9 March 1962, Page 3

West New Guinea

Sir, —In Tuesday’s issue the dispaitch headed “Indonesian Envoys Influencing Dutch” is unfair to President Soekarno. While I think President Soekarno was brash in his recent brush with the Dutch, the statement that he collaborated with the Japanese is extremely unfair. Like all nationalists in South-east Asia, Dr. Soekarno had no illusions about the motives of the Japanese. He responded to the Japanese advances and permitted young Indonesians to be trained by the Japanese as a local militia. This was a correct calculation on President Soekarno’s part because it ultimately gave Indonesia an armed force which was later used to help Indonesia to independence when the Dutch colonials returned to resume their occupation. Supplies of arms found their way to these forces before the Japanese capitulated. The new republic was thus equipped with the means to maintain independence.—Yours, etc, RALPH S. WHEELER. Timaru, March 7, 1962.

Sir,—The “Daily Telegraph’s” assertion, that Indonesian diplomats are privately influencing Dutch citizens to change their Government’s policy gives a strange idea of the large number of Dutch people who have long been opposed to their Government’s colonial policy. The setting up of a “friendly” Papuan State—a plan that has had nodding, but uncommitted, approval from Australia and New Zealand—has never had national support in Holland. One of the ablest colonial administrators advised against it. A picture of Indonesian diplomats, skilfully manipulating a section of Dutch political opinion, as presented by the “Daily Telegraph," is unfair to the Indonesians as well as to the liberal-minded Dutch citizens who are seeking a normalisation of the relation between the two countries. —Yours, etc., DUTCHMAN. March 7, 1962.