ISCI is a cross-disciplinary research centre working to further our understanding of state crime: organisational deviance violating human rights

Undermining Rights: Forced Evictions and Police Brutality

Revenues from mineral operations are essential to the states fiscal health in Papua New Guinea. A special paramilitary unit, the Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary mobile squads, have been the state’s central tool for protecting these important natural resource operations. Indeed, while initially used in the nineteen seventies to combat tribal fighting in Papua New Guineas Highlands, the mobile squads have been increasingly employed by the national government to police mine strikes, landowner disputes and illegal miners. Operating through the weight of numbers and superior firepower the mobile squads have a checkered human rights record. To this end, Amnesty Internationals Undermining Rights documents the mobile squads forced displacement of villagers around the Porgera Mine, during Operation Ipili in 2009. Amnesty International has found evidence that the mobile squads employed assault, rape and property destruction to intimidate villagers. This report is a powerful example of the culture of impunity and violence that pervades the Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary. Read the report: http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/ASA34/001/2010/en/2a498f9d-39f7-47df-b5eb-5eaf586fc472/asa340012010eng.pdf.

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