Residents attack vendors at Bekasi market

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)