The Jakarta Post, May 19, 2005
Weapons used by attackers were stolen firearms: Police
M. Azis Tunny, The Jakarta Post, Ambon
The weapons used to shoot dead five Mobile Brigade troopers during a recent attack
on Seram island, Maluku, were police-issue firearms, a police spokesman said on
Wednesday.
The standard-issue firearms were stolen from an armory at Maluku Provincial Police
Headquarters in Tantui, Ambon city, during disturbances in the city on June 22, 2000.
Besides raiding the armory, the attackers also burned down a nearby police
dormitory.
"We have conducted ballistics tests and are certain that the firearms used to murder
the police officers recently were stolen from our police armory in Tantui," said Maluku
Provincial Police spokesman Comr. Endro Prasetyo.
According to Endro, at least 800 firearms of various types were stolen from the
armory. The raiders also stole thousands of rounds of ammunition.
Endro said that some of the ammunition and weapons had been recovered by police
during the frequent house-to-house searches conducted by the police since the end of
the sectarian disturbances in Ambon. But many more were still unaccounted for.
The police had found various leads near where seven people, including five police
officers, were shot dead on Monday by unknown assailants during an attack targeted
at a police operations command post in Loki village, West Seram regency, Maluku
province. The other two people who died during the attack were a civilian and an
attacker.
Comr. Endro added that police believed the killers of the five police officers and the
civilian were from the same group that had recently mounted terror attacks in various
places in Ambon city, Maluku.
Among these were an armed attack on the Villa Cafe in Hative Besar subdistrict in
February this year and an attack on the Lai-Lai 7 vessel off Maluku island in March.
Endro would not go into detail about the motives behind the latest incident, saying
that police were still pursuing their inquiries.
"They are well trained. We are investigating which group they belonged to and what
the motives were for the attack," said Endro, adding that the police had questioned 10
witnesses to the incident as of Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the remains of the five police officers were buried in their respective
hometowns nationwide on Tuesday and Wednesday. The five were from a Mobile
Brigade unit recruited in East Kalimantan.
All contents copyright © of The Jakarta Post.
|
