Fresh unrest erupts in Ambon
AMBON, Maluku (JP): Fresh unrest erupted in Suli village, Salahutu district, Ambon, Central Maluku, when hundreds of armed men from neighboring Tulehu and Tial villages attacked the area on Tuesday morning.
But officials and residents gave conflicting accounts of the number of fatalities in the incident.
Police claimed there were only two fatalities, including one police officer, while local residents said they saw 27 bodies of attackers in the area, 19 of whom had been properly buried on the same day.
Separately, the Yogyakarta-based Ahlussunah Wal Jamaah Lasykar Jihad task force Commander Ayip Syafruddin confirmed on Tuesday that 27 Muslims, most of them allegedly unarmed civilians, had died in the incident.
Ayip told The Jakarta Post from Surakarta in Central Java by telephone that its Jihad force had attacked Suli village as the villagers there had provoked their anger by saying that Christian villagers had opened fire at a passenger ship carrying Muslims.
"It was an act of self-defense by the Jihad force and local Muslims as we don't want to die without offering any resistance," he said, while claiming that the victims had been shot by police.
Suli residents said the morning attack had razed at least 54 houses in the village, which is situated some 20 kilometers away from Ambon.
The armed attackers, clad in white robes, set up roadblocks on Jl. Batumerah before launching the attack prior to the deployment of reinforcements by the security forces in the village.
A Suli resident, Max de Wana, said the attackers, armed with mortars and homemade bombs, started by burning down two empty houses before they got involved in a firefight with one company of joint military-police security personnel, backed by local residents.
Spokesman for the Ambon-based Maluku Civil Emergency Post John Tomasoa confirmed on Tuesday the attack in Suli village and that barricades had been erected by the attackers.
"I was informed by the Ambon Military Command that six truckloads of soldiers were deployed to Suli village and they had to clear the streets of roadblocks," he said.
Soon after the incident, local residents said they saw dozens of rioters in the Batumerah Tanjung and Galunglung areas, a preliminary indication of a mass mobilization for subsequent attacks.
Similar mass concentrations were also observed in Galala village, in the border zone between the Batumerah and Mardika areas, in Sirimau district, Ambon.
The escalating tension in Suli has resulted in an increase in the number of residents leaving the area and seeking shelter in nearby villages over the past few days. (49/lup)