Rebel shot dead in hunt for Papua gunmen

Rebel shot dead in hunt for Papua gunmen

R.K. Nugroho and Febiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post,
Timika/Jakarta

Security forces shot dead a suspected rebel during a gunfight on
Sunday in the hunt for the armed men who killed two American
schoolteachers and an Indonesian near a U.S. copper and gold mine
in the country's easternmost province of Irian Jaya.

Papua Trikora Military commander Maj. Gen. Mahidin Simbolon
and Provincial Police chief Insp. Gen. Made Mangku Pastika said a
soldier, Chief Pvt. Suherman, was also injured in the shootout,
which broke out at 11 a.m. local time.

Mahidin said thick fog hampered efforts to hunt down the
gunmen, who are suspected members of the rebel Free Papua
Organization (OPM), led by Kelly Kwalik, who ambushed two buses
carrying PT Freeport Indonesia employees from the Tembaga Pura
International school to Timika. Three people, two U.S. citizens
and one Indonesian, were killed in the incident, and another 12
were injured.

Eight of the wounded, three males and five females, including
a six-year-old, were flown to Townsville, Queensland in
Australia. Seven were listed in good or stable condition.

Hundreds of police and military personnel were deployed to
comb the jungle to find the attackers. More troops were coming to
help in the hunt, said Mahidin, who arrived in Timika on Sunday.

He said security forces wanted to capture the gunmen alive in
order to identify them and learn the motive for the attack. He
said there could be as many as 15 gunmen who were involved in the
attack.

The hunt would continue for at least one week or until
security was completely restored, he said.

On Sunday in Jakarta, National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar
conveyed his condolences on behalf of the government to the
families of those killed, and ordered the immediate arrest of the
gunmen.

"They (the attackers) used M-16 machine guns and a rocket
launcher. We are intensifying the search around the area," he
said.

Da'i said the U.S. government had expressed its understanding
of the deadly attack and offered to help in the investigation.

Activities at the immense open-pit mine operated by Freeport,
an affiliate of New Orleans-based Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold,
continued on Sunday despite the shock felt by workers, who feared
further attacks.

"The company's activities are proceeding as usual despite the
fear of more violence against employees," said a worker, who
asked not to be named.

Saturday's incident was the bloodiest involving foreigners in
almost four decades of intermittent warfare between security
forces and separatist rebels in Papua.

The troubled province also saw occasional kidnappings of
foreigners, which were blamed on rebels. In June last year, two
Belgian documentary filmmakers, Johan van den Eynde and Phillipe
Simon, were abducted in Jayawijaya by rebels who released them
two months later.

Since 1963, the poorly organized OPM has waged a low-level
insurgency against Papua's integration into Indonesia, which was
formally ratified in 1969 by the United Nations. Separatists
claim that Papua gained independence from Dutch rule on Dec. 1,
1961.