MANOKWARI:
Indonesia's Papua was hit by fresh unrest yesterday as more than 1,000 security
personnel were sent to the restive region after violent protests that saw
buildings torched and street battles between police and demonstrators. Jakarta
has called for calm in its easternmost territory -- where an insurgency against
Indonesian rule has simmered for decades - following riots triggered by the
detention of dozens of Papuan students in Java at the weekend.

Yesterday, about
1,000 people protested in the streets of Timika city, where an AFP reporter saw
demonstrators throw rocks at the local parliament building as they tried to
tear down its fence. The crowd, which also reportedly pelted shops and homes
with rocks, began to disperse as riot police fired warning shots. Hundreds also
marched through the streets of Sorong city, and hoisted the banned Papuan flag
in the town of Fakfak on the western end of the island, which is divided
between Indonesia and the nation of Papua New Guinea. Police fired tear gas to
disperse crowds in Fakfak after they set fire to a market and destroyed ATMs
and shops, local media reported.

Several cities in
resource-rich Papua were brought to a standstill this week, including Manokwari
where businesses and the local parliament building were set ablaze by angry
demonstrators. Authorities are hunting for more than 250 inmates who had
escaped from a prison in Sorong that was torched during the riots. Several
police officers had been injured, authorities said, and there are unconfirmed
reports of wounded demonstrators. No deaths have been reported.

'Getting out of
control'

Some 1,200 extra
police and troops have been deployed to Manokwari and Sorong from other parts
of the country, according to the government and Papuan authorities. But
security personnel were not equipped with live bullets, and the situation was
"generally under control", National police spokesman Muhammad Iqbal
said yesterday. "It is standard that if things escalate (authorities) will
deploy additional personnel," he added. But the move could aggravate
tensions, observers warned. "It's making Papuans even more angry,"
said human rights lawyer Veronica Koman, a frequent commentator on Papuan
issues. "I'm really afraid this is getting out of control," she
added.

The government
has moved to slow down Internet connections in parts of Papua to stop the
spread of online hoaxes it said could spark more demonstrations. Anger boiled
over at reports that authorities tear-gassed and detained some 43 Papuan
university students in the country's second-biggest city, Surabaya, on Saturday
- Indonesia's independence day. Police in riot gear stormed a dormitory to
force out students who allegedly destroyed an Indonesian flag, as a group of
protesters shouted racial slurs at them. Authorities said the students were
briefly questioned and set free.

'Decades of
frustration'

Indonesian leader
Joko Widodo, who pledged to investigate the Surabaya incident, was expected to
visit Papua next week. "It is sad that the Indonesian government only
listens to their decades of frustration when these people retaliated,"
said Andreas Harsono, a researcher at Human Rights Watch in Jakarta. Papua has
been the scene of a decades-old rebel insurgency aimed at gaining independence
from Indonesia, which took control of the former Dutch colony in the Sixties.

Security forces
have long been accused of committing rights abuses against its ethnic
Melanesian population, who say they've not shared in the region's vast mineral
wealth. Tens of thousands of Papuans have been displaced amid intense fighting
between troops and guerrillas after a rebel faction killed 19 construction
workers at a remote jungle camp last year. The employees of a state-owned
contractor had been building bridges and roads as part of efforts to boost
infrastructure in the impoverished region.- AFP