Police plan to screen outsiders entering Poso
Police plan to screen outsiders entering Poso
La Remy, The Jakarta Post, Palu, Central Sulawesi
The Central Sulawesi Police are considering a regular screening
process of all people arriving in the province in a bid to foil
ammunition smuggling attempts into the conflict-prone regency of
Poso.
Violence has returned to Poso just a few months after a peace
accord was reached between warring Muslim and Christian groups
last December to end two years of sectarian conflict that left
over 1,000 people dead and hundreds of thousands displaced.
A series of explosions have rocked Poso, the latest occurring
on Sept. 26 when a bomb exploded in the town's main market,
injuring four people.
The provincial police chief Brig. Gen. Zainal Abidin Ishak
said on Monday he had urged the local administration to draft
bylaws that would justify the police and the provincial officials
to thoroughly check all outsiders traveling through or
temporarily residing in the region.
He said that the involvement of people from other regions in
illegal trafficking of ammunition in the province was verified by
police findings and information.
"Recently we have foiled an attempt to smuggle a consignment
of more than 2,800 rounds of ammunition conducted by a man
identified as Far, a Jakartan Muslim, who temporarily resides in
Poso on the pretext of selling clothes," he said.
Far and his associate, Sisi, were arrested by the police last
week in the Pantoloan port as they disembarked from the Nggapulu
ship, shortly after it docked following a trip from Jakarta. They
were unloading some 2,845 rounds of ammunition, 12,943 various
kinds of fireworks, and 15 toy guns that are sometimes used to
make homemade firearms.
They said the hazardous materials were obtained from a person
identified only as Tj, in Jakarta and were to be loaded onto
horses so that security personnel would not suspect them.
Far admitted that the materials would be sent to another
accomplice identified only as Tar, in Poso and later delivered to
their associates, a group of Muslim fighters.
"We will cooperate with the National Police headquarters and
the Army headquarters because the ammunition was wrapped in their
original PT Pindad packages, the Bandung-based military weapons
producer," Zainal said.
The police are still questioning the suspects and the
investigation may be linked to the finding of 4,000 more rounds
of ammunition in Poso two years ago that remains unsolved.
Zainal suspected that the two cases were related and the
alleged smugglers worked for the same network. Further
investigation into Tj and Tar will be focused on the network,
Zainal added.