PORT MORESBY – Foreign journalists will still need permits to report from Papuan provinces, according to Indonesia’s chief security minister, despite president Joko Widodo’s claims the region is now unrestricted.

Meanwhile, Papua New Guinean activists supporting the freedom of West Papua say they were detained by police and held without charge after demonstrating at the arrival of the Indonesian president on a state visit to Port Moresby.

Widodo announced last weekend that foreign media were free to report from the provinces of Papua and West Papua.

However, his co-ordinating minister for politics, law and security, Tedjo Edhy Purdijatno, said journalists would still need permits and be subjected to “screening”.

He told government-owned newswire Antara the requirements were to stop the government being blamed if journalists went into “forbidden areas”.

There are reportedly other preconditions, including that reporters are not allowed to do anything to “discredit” Indonesia.

Earlier this week, Widodo announced he had lifted the restrictions that previously prevented foreign journalists from travelling to the country’s restive Papuan provinces.

Independence activists in Papua and West Papua often clash with Indonesian military, but the country is determined to hold onto the resource-rich area and had largely blocked foreign media from covering the region.

Last year, two French journalists were arrested in Papua province for reporting while on tourist visas and spent months in detention before being sent back to France.

Papua New Guinean protestors supporting West Papua activists were detained by police at the arrival of the Indonesian president in Port Morseby on Tuesday.

They marked Indonesian president Joko Widodo’s arrival in Port Moresby by holding flags reading “Indonesia stop the genocide in West Papua” and were detained by police shortly after the demonstration began.

David Dom Kua, general secretary of the PNG Union for Free West Papua, was one of seven people taken into custody and kept without charge for six hours.

“Police were telling us we need to obtain clearance from them,” Kua said. “But we are a democratic country and our constitutional and parliamentary right is to freedom of expression.”

Widodo was in Papua New Guinea for two days of meetings with PNG prime minister Peter O’Neill.

Police told the demonstrators they were “disturbing the flow of traffic” outside the Jacksons International Airport in Port Moresby and “did not have the clearance to be there”.

But Kua said the union, along with other civil society groups, had obtained a court order “some time ago” allowing them to stage protests.

He said their treatment after what was “a peaceful protest” was “unconstitutional”.

“They didn’t charge us –they just detained us, locked us in there for six hours and then later got us released.”

Oro province governor Gary Juffa said the actions of the police may be in breach of the court order.

“It was not a violent protest, there was no huge gathering, it was symbolic – basically stating the concern about the violence and brutality happening across the border in West Papua.”

Independence for the Indonesian province of West Papua, which borders mainland Papua New Guinea, is a sensitive topic.

Last year, Human Rights Watch said more than 60 Papuan activists were in prison for treason charges – many for raising the West Papuan independence symbol, the Morning Star flag.

Earlier this week, Widodo granted clemency to five Papuan political prisoners and lifted foreign media restrictions in the area.

Kua said the demonstrators welcomed the moves and wanted to congratulate Widodo.

“We want to tell him that we actually applaud him – and gratefully commend him for his recent assistance in releasing five prisoners in Papua as well as the uplifting on the media ban in West Papua.

“This has been denied for the people of West Papua for a very long time,” he said.

But the moves had been met with cynicism from some activists, including Juffa, who called them “very clever politics”.

“It’s got nothing to do with humanity,” he said.

“You’ve got to do things like this to suggest that you’re actually making an effort, when in reality you’re not.”