17 Papua New Guinea citizens held in Indonesian Jail on drug trafficking

A total of 17 Papua New Guinea citizens are reported to be held in custody at a prison facility in Jayapura over drug-related cases.

West Sepik Provincial Police Commander, Robert Gesa says, there are no clear indications of who they are and when and how they got themselves imprisoned at the Doyo Jail, near Sentani.

He says initially there were reports of 15 men in the prison facility but with the recent arrest of two men, one caught at Serui and another in Jayapura selling marijuana, the number has now gone up to 17.

Mr. Gesa says he is working closely with the Indonesian consulate in Vanimo to establish links with the prison authorities in Jayapura so that the PNG citizens can be visited and individually interviewed.

He says many of those caught across the border do not enter Indonesia by road but travel out in the open sea by boat evading police and customs detection or cross over further inland at Bewani and in parts of Imonda and Green River.

Mr Gesa says line agencies, including police and customs are ill-equipped and are not able to conduct surveillance both at sea and on land.

This includes, monitoring and controlling the movements of people and drugs at the P-N-G Indonesia border in West Sepik.

Indonesia has tougher penalties for drug smugglers including death.