NSW: Cartoon adds to Aust-Indon row over Papua asylum decision

AAP General News (Australia)
04-01-2006
NSW: Cartoon adds to Aust-Indon row over Papua asylum decision

SYDNEY, April 1 AAP - Australia's biggest-selling national newspaper has entered the
fray in an international row over the granting of asylum to 42 Papuans.

The Australian published a provocative cartoon today apparently depicting the Indonesian
president as a dog sexually domineering a Papuan, who is also depicted as a dog.

In the cartoon by Bill Leak, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono appears as a dominant
dog, tail wagging as he mounts a Papuan with bone in nose, saying: "Don't take this the
wrong way..."

The caption reads: "No Offence Intended".

The cartoons could prove particularly provocative as many Islamic teachers say dogs
are considered unclean and Muslims licked by them must perform purification.

The Bill Leak cartoon follows one in Indonesia this week of John Howard and Alexander
Downer as fornicating dingoes.

It appeared on the front page of one of Indonesia's biggest-selling newspapers, the
Islamic-leaning Rakyat Merdeka (People's Freedom), after Australia granted temporary visas
to 42 Papuans who arrived by boat.

Headlined "The adventure of two dingo" (sic), the drawing showed the prime minister
as the dominant dog, shaking his tail while telling the foreign minister: "I want Papua!!
Alex! Try to make it happen!"

Indonesian nationalists accuse Canberra of secretly plotting the breakaway of the province
of Papua, likening it to the 1999 independence crisis in East Timor.

Indonesia has recalled its ambassador to Australia in response.

AAP pc/rs

KEYWORD: BOAT PAPUA CARTOON

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