Two people killed in latest Aceh violence

JAKARTA (JP): At least two people were killed, and 14 are missing after a weekend attack on a logging camp in the troubled province of Aceh, Antara reported on Monday.

The news agency said the camp at Krueng Tuan village in Nisam district, some 30 kilometers south of the North Aceh capital of Lhokseumawe, was attacked on Saturday by a group of unidentified armed people.

Local police spokesman Lt. Col. Amrin Karim was quoted as saying that police were still investigating the attack.

AFP, however, quoted witnesses who visited the site as saying that at least four timber workers were killed, four were wounded, while seven went missing.

Witnesses were also quoted as saying that they saw the graves of the four killed during the attack on the camp.

A local human rights activist said on Monday that an unidentified male body was found in Lhokseumawe in the late afternoon.

"Residents found the mutilated body in Mongedong area in Banda Sakti district at about 4 p.m. and it was taken directly to the Lhokseumawe General Hospital," Yakob Hamzah of the Iskandarmuda Legal Aid Institute told The Jakarta Post by phone from Lhokseumawe.

Head of the hospital, Mulya A. Hasjmy, however, denied the report, saying that no unidentified body had been received at the hospital's morgue.

In the past few months Aceh has seen a sharp resurgence in violence between Indonesian Military (TNI) soldiers and police and Free Aceh movement (GAM) supporters.

At least 223 people have been killed in the conflict since May. Hundreds of buildings, including schools, have also been set on fire. Antara quoted officials from the crisis center of the local health office as saying that more than 144,000 people were still sheltering in mosques, schools and government offices throughout the province.

More than 92,000 people are currently sheltering in Pidie, while another 38,000 people are in North Aceh and East Aceh. Outbreaks of diarrhea among refugees, due to unclean drinking water, as well as skin diseases and respiratory tract problems, have been reported.

An official was also quoted as saying that at least 35 people in the refugee camps had died as a result of various diseases.

Chairman of the National Commission on Human Rights Marzuki Darusman met with a representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Jakarta last week. He said the rights body wanted to see UNHCR expand its role in Aceh.

In a related issue, the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI) reported on Monday that the United Nations' subcommission on human rights meeting in Geneva was marked by attendees' condemnation of human rights abuses in Indonesia, especially in Aceh.

The meeting, being held between Aug. 2 and Aug. 27, described Indonesia as having committed gross violations of human rights in Aceh, and expressed alarm over the growing "culture of impunity" here.

"It's possible that the meeting may issue a resolution against Indonesia," said PBHI spokesman R. Dwiyanto Prihartono, adding that although Indonesia had one of the worst human rights records, the country had never been on the receiving end of a UN resolution. (byg/swe)