Riot battalion reinforcements for Maluku
Riot battalion reinforcements for Maluku
JAKARTA (JP): Another battalion of riot troops from Java will
be deployed to Southeast Maluku regency as the death toll from
clashes there continues to rise, police said on Wednesday.
Maluku Police spokesman Maj. Jekriel Philipis told Antara
sporadic clashes between groups of Muslims and Christians on
Tuesday killed at least 28 people, bringing the death toll from
recent violence in the regency to 80.
Jekriel said from Ambon that 17 bodies were found in the
Southeast Maluku regency capital of Tual, 10 bodies were found in
neighboring Kei Besar district and another body was discovered in
Kei Kecil district. Unrest also occurred in the districts of Kei
Besarlekat and North Tanimbar, but no fatalities were reported.
Some 55 people were injured and nearly 300 houses and
buildings and scores of vehicles set on fire in violence on
Tuesday.
Antara reported no fresh clashes on Wednesday.
"We call for people to stop fighting because experience has
taught us that it is the regular people who fall victim in such
conflicts. The provocateurs, intellectual ones in particular, are
still at large and must be all smiles for causing such successful
unrest," Jekriel said.
He said the additional battalion of riot troops was expected
to arrive in the regency by the weekend. The Armed Forces earlier
deployed a battalion of reinforcements to the regency when
communal clashes broke out at the end of March.
A battalion comprises some 1,000 troops.
Jekriel appealed to warring parties to lay down their weapons
and seek a peaceful settlement to their grievances.
"The clashes in fact pit brother against brother and fathers
against their children. Let's stop the clashes for the sake of
the development of the country," he said.
Religious conflicts in Southeast Maluku erupted just after the
Maluku capital of Ambon began to return to normal after months of
unrest. Some 200 people died in the violence in Ambon.
The crisis settlement center set up by the local Communion of
Churches blamed the renewed unrest in Maluku on the government.
In a statement made available to The Jakarta Post on Tuesday, the
center said the religious conflicts hit Southeast Maluku because
of the government's failure to adequately cope with the core
causes of the problems in Ambon.
"It's not difficult to answer why the unrest spilled over to
the Kei islands, and very possibly will spill over to other areas
in Maluku," center coordinator Rev. Dicky Mailoa said.
He suspects a series of attacks on predominantly Christian
villages in Tual were orchestrated by the same people who
provoked the unrest in Ambon. "Other than the wearing different
clothes, we found in some areas the attackers used the same
weapons and tactics as in Ambon," Dicky said.
The crisis center also hinted that not all clashes pitted
Muslims against Christians.
It reported that in one of the clashes on Monday, both
Christian and Muslim residents in two separate villagers faced
attackers.
Thousands of miles away in West Kalimantan, tension gripped
the small town of Singkawang on Wednesday after three people died
and 20 were injured after police opened fire on a crowd of people
marching to the local legislature.
The police opened fire to disperse the thousands-strong crowd
of mostly Malays who were marching to the legislature to demand
the release of 70 people being detained by the police for
allegedly provoking the recent communal unrest in the area.
Local legislator Bong Cin Nen told the Post the crowd was
trying to march to the local legislature office when police
blocked their way in Naram hamlet, Tujuhbelas district, on the
outskirts of the town.
Cin Nen said the crowd planned to march to the legislature to
ask legislators to help free the 70 people.
The people were peaceful and unarmed, according to Cin Nen.
But Antara quoted police as saying they were forced to open fire
on the crowd because they had changed direction and burst into
the police station.
Police arrested 32 people, Antara said. (aan/amd)