Residents attack vendors at Bekasi market

BEKASI (JP): One man was killed on Thursday morning when hundreds of residents of Ringin village, Bekasi, attacked vendors and burned their pushcarts and tables at the Bekasi Jaya market across from the Bekasi bus terminal.

The chief of the Bekasi Police's riot unit, Second. Insp. Aat Nasir, said the incident was sparked by the stabbing of public minivan driver Dian Ardiansyah, 30, a Ringin resident, by a teenager in front of the bus terminal.

Aat said the incident started when the teenager asked Dian for money. In response, Dian slapped the teenager, who ran into a foodstall, grabbed a knife and stabbed the driver.

The driver later died at Bekasi General Hospital.

Upon hearing of Dian's death, Ringin residents gathered and began searching for the teenager, who was hiding in a foodstall in the Bekasi Jaya market.

The residents destroyed the foodstall and killed its owner, identified as Bako, 32, a resident of Duren Jaya subdistrict, East Bekasi.

"After the attack the residents were still unsatisfied so they came back and pushed many of the vendors' pushcarts upside down and set them ablaze," Aat said.

Most of the vendors in the market closed their stalls and fled the area.

The violence subsided at about 10 a.m. when hundreds of officers from Bekasi Police Headquarters and all of the police subprecincts in Bekasi regency arrived at the scene. Reinforcements from East Jakarta Police Headquarters were also deployed to the market and bus terminal.

Aat said the police detained two people who were spotted burning vendors' pushcarts, seizing a sickle from one of the suspects.

Commuters and buses and public minivans began returning to the terminal at about 11 a.m. (01)