SUNDAY, 11 November 2001, at around 12pm, the lawyer for the Papuan Presidium Council (PDP) sent me an SMS, "Bapak Theys has left us for ever." Theys was found dead in his car on the outskirts of Jayapura, near the border of Papua New Guinea and the Province of Papua. For the umpteenth time political violence was highly visible in Papua.

Theys' death struck terror into the hearts of both the public and PDP acti