DATE=12/31/1999
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=INDONESIA UNREST (L-ONLY)
NUMBER=2-257636
BYLINE=RON CORBEN
DATELINE=BANGKOK
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: Villagers in Indonesia's once-peaceful Spice
Islands buried their dead Friday, as the toll from
sectarian clashes there reached 350. Ron Corben
reports from our Southeast Bureau in Bangkok, a
humanitarian group is warning the turmoil is prompting
a health emergency, as well.
TEXT: Thousands of terrified refugees continued to
flee the violent clashes between Christians and
Muslims Friday, as villagers in Indonesia's Mulaku
province buried their dead.
This week's sectarian fighting in the province has
centered on Ambon, the provincial
capital, 23-hundred kilometers from Jakarta, the
nearby Buru island and Halmahera island, 600
kilometers north of Ambon - where the bloodshed has
taken a heavy toll.
The latest terror, which has left some one thousand
dead in the past year -- and possibily as many as 15-
hundred by unofficial accounts -- is the worst of any
religious conflict in the republic's 50-year history.
Indonesia's military has reported some 12-thousand
people from both Maluku and North Maluku province
seeking refuge from the fighting in army
and police barracks and other installations.
But after a further night of violence and terror, with
the sounds of gunshots and buildings set ablaze,
Ambon-based military
spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Iwa Budiman, said
fighting had ceased Friday. Nevertheless, the port
city remained tense and roads were deserted.
In a statement released in New York, the humanitarian
aid group, Doctors Without Borders, said health
conditions in the Malukus are
rapidly deteriorating due to the fighting.
The statement said health care personnel are afraid to
cross religious lines, medical supplies are not being
delivered and people in need of care are trapped in
areas controlled by the other religion.
The humanitarian group says the situation threatens to
add to the death toll, as people die simply because
they are unable to gain access to medical care.
/// REST OPT ///
The region has been seen as a model of interfaith
tolerance, in largely Muslim Indonesia. But animosity
between the groups rose after an influx of Muslim
migrants from elsewhere in the country. Resentment
was reportedly fueled as the new residents, many from
Sulawesi, began to dominate retail trading, siphoning
business away from Christians.
Indonesian political analysts are now warning the
violence could threaten to disrupt the whole nation.
Arie Susilo, of the University of Indonesia, says if
the government fails to handle the problem
immediately, it may well spread to other regions
undermining the administration's credibility.
Other analysts say the crisis in the Malakus should
not be allowed to destroy the democratic gains the
country has achieved in the past year.
Earlier this week an Indonesian regional commander
called for martial law to be imposed in the
archipelago. But President Abdurrahman Wahid rejected
the appeals. Mr. Wahid, who visited Ambon earlier this
month, has also ruled out foreign invention saying the
conflict is an internal affair. (SIGNED)
NEB/RC/FC/PLM
31-Dec-1999 03:54 AM EDT (31-Dec-1999 0854 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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