Human Righrs Monitor
1) Annual Report 2025: Human Rights and Conflict in West Papua
Reports / Indonesia, West Papua / 13 March 2026
Executive Summary
The human rights situation in West Papua[1] throughout 2025 reveals a critical pivot point in the decades-long conflict between the Indonesian state and the indigenous Papuan population. While certain systemic patterns, such as the architecture of legal impunity and the suppression of peaceful political dissent, remain stagnant, 2025 has introduced a series of aggressive new patterns that represent a significant departure from the dynamics of 2024 and previous years. Case documentation by local human rights groups and independent activists indicates that the situation has transitioned from a localised highland insurgency into an extensive and modern tactics warfare across the central highlands.
Military members are pushing into remote areas, establishing military outposts in indigenous villages to gain control over remote areas. Military operations in these areas have been characterised by the use of anti-personnel landmines or booby traps and aerial warfare technologies, including weaponised drones and fighter planes. The massive structural expansion of the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI) under the administration of President Prabowo Subianto opened new frontiers for systematic land grabbing in Merauke, Biak-Numfor, Intan Jaya, and other geographic areas of economic interest.
The data indicate that the primary drivers of conflict-related human rights violations are no longer immediate responses to armed resistance, but a coordinated effort to secure territory for resource extraction and economic development in West Papua. Indonesia’s new administration under President Prabowo Subianto has pursued a security-based approach, introducing plans for up to 500 new battalions to secure and implement infrastructure and agribusiness projects. This marks the most significant peacetime military expansion in Indonesia’s modern history. As the number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) continues to climb and the military presence keeps expanding, indigenous Papuans face an existential threat to their security, land and culture.
As of December 2025, over 105,000 people in West Papua were internally displaced, with most IDPs having not returned to their villages due to ongoing conflict or heavy military presence. The number of IDPs has risen from roughly 85,000 IDPs reported in 2024. The central government continues to deny the existence of conflict-driven internal displacement in West Papua, showing no signs of facilitating humanitarian access or withdrawal of security force personnel from the region. Many displaced families have lived in limbo since the armed conflict situation significantly deteriorated in December 2018, afraid to return to their militarised home areas. IDPs are sheltering in makeshift camps or remote forests with little to no aid, facing acute shortages of food, clean water, medicine, and shelter. Ongoing security operations impede humanitarian access to IDPs, whose vast majority consists of indigenous Papuans. They are disproportionately affected by these operations, which commonly target indigenous communities. Examples from Intan Jaya, Pegunungan Bintang, and other regencies illustrate that the increased presence of security personnel in previously unaffected areas fuels violence and suffering for the local civilian population, rather than establishing security and stability.
Extrajudicial killings, torture, and enforced disappearances persisted at alarming rates. Reported cases of torture and ill-treatment of Papuan civilians rose significantly in comparison to previous years. The year 2025 also saw a spike in the cases of extrajudicial executions, arbitrary detention, intimidation, and violations of the freedom of assembly. Civilians in conflict areas bear the risk of violence from both state and non-state actors, resulting in dozens of deaths, injuries, and at least 11 reported victims of enforced disappearance throughout the year. Like previous years, the militarisation of government administration under President Prabowo and the restriction of independent media impede the exposure of human rights violations to the Indonesian public and international community. Narratives about West Papua in the national media are often shaped by the military, which is often the only state institution present in conflict areas.
Freedom of expression and peaceful assembly continued to face heavy restrictions in 2025. Indonesian authorities cracked down on protests and political dissent in West Papua, often with arbitrary arrests and force. Journalists and human rights defenders also faced intimidation and violence, highlighted by the unresolved Molotov attack on the Papuan media outlet Jubi. A landmark Constitutional Court ruling in May 2025 offered a rare positive development. The constitutional court strengthened protections for free speech by barring government bodies and officials from using defamation laws to target critics.
Indigenous Papuans’ land rights and livelihoods came under increasing pressure in 2025. Government-driven natural resource projects accelerated without meaningful consent, leading to systematic indigenous rights violations. In the central highlands, military units occupied villages near the Wabu Block gold mining concession in Intan Jaya, prompting community mass protests. In the Papua Selatan Province, the Strategic National Project (PSN) in Merauke continued expansion. The massive agricultural project is implemented by military personnel without Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) of the indigenous Marind people. Likewise, in Papua Barat Daya Province, the Indigenous Moi Tribe struggled against new palm oil concessions that threaten West Papua’s last intact forests. Large-scale agricultural projects, timber logging, and mining operations have led to massive environmental destruction and the erosion of indigenous culture.
The accessibility, quality, and adequacy of healthcare and education services in West Papua are poor, ranking among the lowest in the country. There are no signs of improvement, especially in conflict-affected areas. Hundreds of villages in the highlands do not have access to functional schools or clinics because teachers and health workers fled ongoing violence. Even in urban areas, public services have reached alarming low levels. Major hospitals faced staff strikes and corruption scandals. These failures, alongside significant special autonomy funds ostensibly allocated to West Papua, underscore a persistent gap in basic services and government accountability.
The 2025 Annual Report is organised in two main parts, following the 2024 report structure. Section I covers Civil and Political Rights, examining patterns of impunity, violence, restrictions on fundamental freedoms, indigenous peoples’ rights, and social rights (health, education). Section II addresses Conflict and Displacement, detailing the armed conflict dynamics and the internal displacement crisis. Statistical tables are included below to summarise key trends.
Australia West Papua Association Adelaide 