The Australian, April 29, 2004
Jakarta pulls veil over Ambon
By Jakarta correspondent Sian Powell
INDONESIAN authorities have moved to close down information on the sectarian strife
in Ambon city, with only the governor and his public relations manager allowed to
comment.
Police and civil authorities yesterday declined to give detailed information on the
religious conflict which has already killed at least 28 people and left more than 150
wounded.
"Everything is calm," is all police spokesman Hendro Prasetyo would say of the city,
which witnesses said echoed to shootings and explosions until at least mid-afternoon
yesterday, the fourth day of the conflict.
A reporter from Siwalima newspaper, Levi Kariuw, spent some of Tuesday night in the
Nazareth protestant church in Karang Panjang. By yesterday the church was a
smoking ruin. "I truly believe the TNI (the Indonesian armed forces) were involved," he
said.
"Eight soldiers from Kostrad 831 came and said they guaranteed the security of the
church so it wouldn't be torched. They asked everyone to leave. In fact, 15 minutes
after everyone left, there was an explosion and the church was burning."
Eleven houses near the church were also burned, he said.
The Indonesian military have been accused of abetting the inter-religious violence
which wracked Ambon between 1999 and 2002. The sectarian war claimed 9000 lives,
and left Ambon city and Ambon island divided.
Troops maintained a form of order, but eventually then-president Abdurrahman Wahid
was forced to send in a detachment of "clean" soldiers in an attempt to restore faith in
the military.
One inner-city Ambon resident and telecommunications worker, who was frightened to
give her name, said she heard gunfire all day, and she could see the black smoke
rising from various districts.
"The military said people should find a safe place to go and keep themselves safe,"
she said. "But where is safe?"
Indonesia's national police chief, Dai Bachtiar, and the nation's chief security minister,
Hari Sarbarno, flew to Ambon to meet with provincial governor Karel Rahalalu to
discuss the situation. The three met at Ambon airport in the relative safety across the
harbour from Ambon city.
A spokeswoman for the provincial administration, Dr Lies Ulahay Yanan, said the
gunfire and explosions were only heard in the middle of the night. From dawn, she
said, Ambon city had been calm. Schools and many offices, she said, remained
closed, but some civil servants were at work.
© The Australian
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