Violence rages in Spice Islands

JAKARTA, JULY 16. At least 21 people died in fighting between Christians and Muslims in Indonesia's ravaged Spice Islands as the latest bloodshed entered its fourth day, with at least 14 deaths reported yesterday alone.

Residents said gunshots and explosions echoed across the once- picturesque harbourside city of Ambon today and thick piles of smoke choked the air as mobs rampaged and torched buildings.

``A church was burned down yesterday and the Muslims are still on the rampage attacking Christian villages,'' said Semmy Waileruny, a lawyer for the Communion of Churches in the Moluccas, adding eight Christians were killed on Saturday.

A Muslim leader said at least six Muslims died. ``The Christians are attacking a Muslim village, they also threw bombs into a boarding house of Muslim police,'' said Mr. Malik Selang, chief of the Indonesian Ulemas Council, in the Moluccas.

The latest killings bring the death toll from the four days of fighting in the main city of the Moluccas to at least 21.

The thousands of police and soldiers in the area have been unable to end the unrest.

Both sides accuse the police and the army of incompetence and joining the fighting in the islands, about 2,300 km east of Jakarta.

`Rogue army officers'

In an interview published yesterday, the Defence Minister, Mr. Juwono Sudarsono, blamed rogue army officers for inflaming the religious war and urged their sacking.

``There are some, or even many, members of the army, according to information gathered from both of the warring camps, who have become a major cause of the clashes,'' the Jakarta Post quoted Mr. Sudarsono saying.

He said some soldiers had been `uncontrollable factors' in the bloodshed from the time it erupted in January 1999 after a dispute between a Christian bus driver and a Muslim passenger.

Thousands have since been slaughtered, many unarmed men, women and children, and tens of thousands have fled the once idyllic Moluccas for squalid refugee camps in neighbouring provinces.

Last month, almost 500 Christian refugees fleeing the northern Moluccas died when their overcrowded ferry sank in rough seas just kilometres away from the safety of neighbouring Sulawesi.

- Reuters

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Section  : International
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