The Jakarta Post, February 26, 2005
Snipers placed in Maluku ahead of separatist anniversary day
JAKARTA (AFP): Police have deployed snipers in the restive Indonesian province of
Maluku ahead of a separatist independence day anniversary next month, the military
said on Saturday.
The snipers from the elite police Mobile Brigade unit were stationed in four restive
neighborhoods in the provincial capital of Ambon on Friday, said Sergeant Major
Yacob Rangkoli of the Ambon district military command.
"The snipers are stationed to prevent possible unrest during next month's anniversary
of the Republic of South Maluku and we are part of the security backup," he told AFP.
Rangkoli said the situation in Ambon was "grave butcontrollable".
Supporters of the self-declared Republic of South Maluku are expected to attend a
flag-raising ceremony to mark the "independence day" of the banned group in Ambon
on April 25.
In April last year, a parade by the Christian-affiliated separatists sparked violence in
which at least 38 people were killed after a week of bloody communal unrest.
Muslims saw the parade as a threat even though separatists make up only a small
percentage of the local Christian population.
The violence was the worst since a pact in February 2002 ended three years of
Muslim-Christian clashes which had left more than 5,000 people dead.
Residents loyal to Dutch colonial rulers proclaimed the Malukus a republic in 1950.
The Dutch had formally conceded Indonesia's independence a year earlier, and the
movement was quickly quelled. (**)
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