Independent team needed to probe Papua ambush
The Jakarta Post, Timika/Jakarta
Human rights groups demanded on Monday that an independent team be established to investigate the deadly ambush that left two U.S. citizens and one Indonesian dead in Irian Jaya on Saturday as speculation surfaced that military personnel might have been involved in the incident.
Chairman of the Papuan chapter of the Institute for Human Rights Studies and Advocacy (Elsham) Aloysius Renwarin condemned the attack and urged the government to engage foreigners in tracking down the gunmen and investigating the incident.
Renwarin questioned the roadside ambush that broke out in an area close to a security post at the Freeport complex, which has been tightly guarded by the Army's elite forces, Kostrad and Kopassus.
"If the attackers were members of an armed separatist group, why did they not target the security post? It's strange. What was behind that?" he said.
Human rights activists grouped under a coalition called the National Solidarity for Papua said on Monday that the attack appeared to have been carried out by "snipers or professional sharpshooters" accustomed to special military operations.
"This should be taken into consideration when determining the real culprits," the group said in a statement.
Papua's Trikora Military chief Maj. Gen. Mahidin Simbolon denied security forces played a role in the attack and simply said it was impossible for security forces to continuously guard all the areas in Papua, which is three times larger than Java.
Provincial Police spokesman Comr. Josef Iswanto said bullet casings showed that the attackers used M-16 and SS1 machine guns, which are standard issue for soldiers or police personnel.
But he denied the alleged involvement of security personnel, arguing that rebels had in the past seized weapons from police and troops they attacked.
Meanwhile, Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said on Monday that he was told by intelligence that three members of the Papuan Presidium Council (PDP) had held a meeting with several non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Australia.
However, he could not say whether the meeting was related to the incident near the Freeport mine.
"If the information is correct, then I will use a diplomatic way to find out the main agenda behind the meeting," Susilo said.
Hundreds of soldiers and police officers continued the hunt for the gunmen on Monday by combing the mist-covered jungles on the mountains near the scene of the incident.
Mahidin said little progress had been made in the search in the jungle, located about 4,000 meters above sea level, after security forces shot dead a suspected rebel earlier in an exchange of fire on Sunday.
No arrests had been made, and there were no armed encounters on Monday, he said.
As bad weather and rugged terrain were hampering the search, Mahidin refrained from promising to capture the gunmen, who sprayed bullets at two buses carrying Freeport employees from the Tembagapura International School. Two American schoolteachers and one Indonesian were killed and 12 others were wounded.
Eight of the injured workers were recovering on Monday at the Townsville Hospital in northeastern Australia, where they were being treated after they were flown out of Papua.
Their injuries ranged from "relatively minor" to "very serious," hospital spokeswoman Kate Coward told AFP.
They are unable to identify their attackers, she added.
In Timika, workers and their families returned to the Freeport mining complex under tight security on Monday after the road to the site was closed for two days.
Two platoons of soldiers escorted a convoy of 40 cars and buses carrying about 140 people, many of them American women and children, to their houses near the giant gold and copper mine.
The company, an affiliate of New Orleans-based Freeport- McMoRan Copper & Gold, said production at the open pit mine had not been affected by the bloodshed.