Global Policy Forum

BP's base camp in Indonesian-controlled West Papua is tucked away in the rainforest on the remote territory's southern coast. The Bintuni Bay camp is an outpost of Western corporate culture, completely out of place amid the dug-out fishing canoes and villages built on stilts.

It is also the future site of the Tangguh project – a liquid natural gas (LNG) venture that is poised to make BP the largest single foreign investor in Indonesia. In West Papua there is no shortage of contradictions. Towering sago palms, ancient lowland rainforest, tidal rivers and dense mangrove islets obscure an even more complex political landscape.

On one side a corrupt and brutal military is deeply involved in the illegal trade of timber and rare species. It sees corporate investment as an opportunity to extort protection money. On the other side a popular and increasingly savvy independence movement is asserting its right to economic control over West Papua's natural resources. And in the middle is a growing list of foreign companies that are courted by the Jakarta government and eager to take advantage of the territory's vast forests and rich mineral wealth. BP is no exception.

Construction on BP's processing plant begins next year. The project is expected to be running by 2006, and to eventually export seven million tonnes of LNG a year. BP is selling Tangguh as ‘a model project for social empowerment and sustainable development'.

Team talk

The weekly safety talk at the BP camp is a surreal experience. When I visited, there were 40 or 50 of the camp's then residents in attendance. A man in an army-green one-piece number (I later learned he was the camp safety officer) gave what was meant to be a motivational safety speech. But it was too much like a military rant to inspire, and he received grudging applause.

After the meeting I chatted with Jim, the Texan camp manager. He told me the place had become ‘fairly civilised'. It had come a long way in two years. Previously, Jim ‘had enough trouble just getting them all to keep their shoes on'. BP is crazy about on-site health and safety. Ubiquitous posters give vivid pictorial warnings of what might happen if proper procedures are not observed on planes and helicopters. ‘Only undertake activities you are competent in and have the authorisation to perform. If in doubt – ASK! If you need help – ASK!' And so on.

If this obsession with safety codes and enforcement were intended only to prevent bizarre mishaps, it would be a waste of time and energy. But as a regulating concept and an integral part of company culture, it serves a different purpose. It precludes spontaneous action and ensures everything is done consciously, deliberately and according to formula. It effectively regulates the actions of each individual and distributes the task of regulation throughout the community. By getting that community to self-regulate, it strives to remove the need for overt hierarchic control.

The similar concept of ‘security' is used by the Indonesian military and police as a tool of manipulation and economic control. The military encourages and creates conflicts, attributes violence to the OPM (Papuan Freedom Organisation) so as to justify its own violent operations, and then uses this manufactured instability to extort protection money from companies with interests in the affected area.

BP has made it clear it does not want a security contract with the Indonesian military. But the military very much wants a contract with BP. Major General Simbolon, Indonesia's military commander in West Papua, visited the base camp last March. Simbolon called BP's project an object of national economic interest, which under Indonesian law means it must be protected by the military.

Military-free zone

BP is ‘promoting the concept of community-based security'. It wants to create a military-free zone around the project site, and plans to train local villagers as security. But its ability to do this is limited: consultants at the camp readily admit that they may have ‘neighbour issues' with a nearby logging concession owned by the Indonesian consortium Djayanti. The concession is heavily guarded by the military.

Furthermore, a convoluted and tragic series of events in the neighbouring Wasior sub-district carries disturbing implications for BP's hoped-for isolation. On June 13, 2001, five mobile police were killed only 60 km from Bintuni Bay. Their deaths inspired a massive and ongoing operation in Wasior that has been marked by many counts of torture and at least six extra-judicial executions. Houses (and one entire village) have been flattened, and hundreds of refugees have been driven to the cities of Manokwari and Nabire. Papuan human rights activists and independent investigators believe the events in Wasior were an attempt by the military to establish the instability of the region and ultimately to secure the desired contract with BP.

BP emphatically denies such a connection. Yet neither has it publicly condemned the human rights abuses. Instead it has made every effort to distance itself from the events in Wasior. It is not difficult to guess why. BP has not had an easy time selling its gas. Tangguh is perceived as a risky investment, and numerous articles have suggested that security concerns have played a crucial role in BP's failure to lure potential buyers.

Perhaps BP will be able to maintain its conscious isolation. But that is not a luxury shared by Papuans. BP cannot control the actions of bored military personnel who are stationed nearby and see the project as either an imposition or an ideal opportunity for extortion. As long as BP operates independently there are those in the military who will continue to see the company as an untapped resource.

BP might be able to protect its employees from splintered feet and decapitation by helicopter blades. But it is powerless to protect or control those who live outside this safe space. It cannot, however, escape the fact that it is operating within, and inevitably affecting, a larger community – a conflict-ridden and militarised community controlled by an army that is used to having its way and to acting without reprisal. That army is not shy of ripping apart lives and entire villages to secure the cash it considers its right.

In West Papua BP cannot help but be a political force. It must accept the responsibility that entails, even if it means placing a hold on investment until West Papua ceases to be a military stronghold.

Katie Wilson visited West Papua as part of a group monitoring BP's project.

CORPORATE IRRESPONSIBILITY

BP has spent millions of greenwash dollars in attempts to convince us that it is an environmentally sound oil company.

Below are a few examples of BP's track record to date:

• BP claims to be the ‘largest producer of solar energy in the world'... largely based on their acquisition of the Solarex corporation for $45 million. This is approximately 0.5% of the amount BP spent to buy Arco ($26.5 billion), and an infinitesimally small percentage of the $110 billion BP paid for Amoco. In fact, the company spent more on its new eco-friendly logo last year than it did on renewable energy. For more info. visit http://archive.greenpeace.org/~climate/ arctic99/html/content/solargrowth.html

• An intelligence report linked to the Sunday Times documents how BP used bribes and a supply of military arms to systematically undermine the government of Azerbaijan. The subsequent coup which took place in 1993 caused the death of 40 people along with violence and repression of the Azeri citizens. A year later BP and Amoco – who have since merged – signed a deal worth US$8 billion dollars, awarding them drilling rights in the country.

• In March 2000, BP Amoco invested US$1 billion in PetroChina, a wholly owned subsidiary of the National Petroleum Company (CNPC). CNPC has been linked to numerous war-crimes in Sudan.

• Construction of the 1,100 mile Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan pipeline from the Caspian sea to the Mediterranean is expected to begin in December. A coalition of over 60 environmental organisations and human rights groups has warned that the project will re-ignite regional conflicts and will destroy roads, homes, fields and damage many people's livelihoods. Only a minority of those affected will be eligible for compensation. For an excellent article by George Monbiot on the pipeline, go to: http://www.guardian.co.uk/oil/story/ 0,11319,785299,00.html

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