In contrast, the Indonesian Republic, as successor state to the Netherlands East Indies, claimed Dutch New Guinea as part of its natural territorial bounds.

The dispute over New Guinea was an important factor in the quick decline in bilateral relations between the Netherlands and Indonesia after Indonesian independence.

Following the Vlakke Hoek incident, Indonesia launched a campaign of infiltrations designed to place pressure on the Dutch.

The afdeelings were led by controleurs normally responsible for onderafdeeling instead of the usual asistent-resident due to newly established nature of the land.

While Afdeeling Zuid-New-Guinea consisted of the part of Dutch New Guinea from Cape Steenboom to the mouth of the Bensbach river and surrounding islands, under an assistent-resident with a to be determined capital.

The reduction in the status of the three afdeelings in Papua to onderafdeeling, and before that the Residentie Nieuw Guinea into Amboina, was caused by the decline in the regional income since the ban of hunting Cendrawasih in 1922.

In a 1660 treaty, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) recognised the Sultanate of Tidore's supremacy over the Papuan people, the inhabitants of New Guinea.

In 1898, the Netherlands Indies government decided to establish administrative posts in Fakfak and Manokwari, followed by Merauke in 1902.

In the colonial society of the Netherlands Indies, they held a higher social status than indigenous Indonesians ("inlanders").

In 1926, a separate Vereniging tot Kolonisatie van Nieuw-Guinea (Association for the Settlement of New Guinea) was founded.

These associations succeeded in sending settlers to New Guinea and lobbied successfully for the establishment of a government agency to subsidise these initiatives (in 1938).

However, most settlements ended in failure because of the harsh climate and natural conditions, and because of the fact the settlers, previously office workers, were not skilled in agriculture.

In the Netherlands proper, some organisations existed that promoted a kind of "tropical Holland" in New Guinea, but they were rather marginal.

[4] Behind Japanese lines in New Guinea, Dutch guerrilla fighters resisted under Mauritz Christiaan Kokkelink.

After Japan's surrender, Sukarno issued the Proclamation of Indonesian Independence, which was to encompass the whole of the Netherlands Indies.

The new Grooter Nederland-Actie (Extended Netherlands Action) send delegates to this conference, who opined that New Guinea should be declared as separate entities in a similar manner to Surinam.

Van Mook's plan was to divide Indonesia into several federal states, negaras, with possible autonomous areas, daerahs.

Because Indonesian nationalists, which had no electoral or official legitimacy—save ethno-state nationalism, under Sukarno cooperated with the Japanese, they were branded as traitors and collaborators.

The newly established liberal People's Party for Freedom and Democracy campaigned for a hard-line policy against the nationalists.

Minister of Colonies Jan Anne Jonkman defended the Linggadjati Agreement in Parliament in 1946 by stating that the government wished for New Guinea to remain under Dutch sovereignty, arguing it could be a settlement for Eurasians.

Duly accepted, the Netherlands thus unilaterally 'amended' the Linggadjati agreement to the effect that New Guinea would remain Dutch.

On 8 February 1950, Stephan Lucien Joseph van Waardenburg was appointed the first Governor (De Gouverneur) of Dutch New Guinea.

Elections were held in January 1961 and the New Guinea Council officially took office on 5 April 1961, to prepare for full independence by the end of that decade.

On 19 December 1961 Sukarno issued the Tri Komando Rakjat (People's Triple Command), calling the Indonesian people to defeat the formation of an independent state of West Papua, raise the Indonesian flag in that country, and be ready for mobilisation at any time.

[13] Facing mounting international diplomatic pressure and the prospect of an Indonesian invasion force, the Dutch conceded to re-entering negotiations and agreed to the Ellsworth Bunker proposal on 28 July 1962, for a staged transition from Dutch to Indonesian control via UN administration, on the condition that a plebiscite would be held in future in the territory.

[14] The agreement was signed on 15 August 1962 at the UN Headquarters in New York and the territory was placed under the United Nations Temporary Executive Authority in October 1962.

[15] The territory formally became part of Indonesia in 1969 after the Indonesian government, who shifted to New Order under President Suharto starting from 1966, conducted a nominally Bunker proposal-based plebiscite termed the Act of Free Choice.