JAYAPURA, Indonesia (AP): Indonesia's security forces have clashed with separatist rebels in the restive Papua region, leaving at least 18 insurgents and two police officers dead, officials and the rebels said Friday.
The battle erupted Wednesday when dozens of rebels armed with military-grade weapons and arrows attacked troops preparing to offer health and education services to villages in Intan Jaya, a hotbed of the insurgency, said Lt. Col. Iwan Dwi Prihartono, a military spokesperson.
"The situation changed when an armed group ambushed dozens of government soldiers,” Prihartono said in a video statement. "So at that moment we carried out a measured and professional action operation.”
Security forces seized one assault rifle, a homemade rifle, several arrows, rounds of ammunition and a "morning star” flag - a separatist symbol - after the clash, Prihartono said, adding there were no casualties on the government side.
Rebels in Papua have been fighting a low-level insurgency since the early 1960s, when Indonesia annexed the region, a former Dutch colony. Papua was incorporated into Indonesia in 1969, after a U.N.-sponsored ballot that was widely seen as a sham.
Sebby Sambom, a spokesman for the rebel West Papua Liberation Army, the armed wing of the Free Papua Movement, said only three of the group's fighters were killed. He claimed that the rest of the dead were "innocent residents” shot by the troops.
Sambom said the rebels killed two police Friday in the neighboring regency of Puncak Jaya in retaliation for the death of Bumiwalo Enumbi, a key member of the group.
Rebel attacks have spiked in recent years, with dozens of rebels, security forces and civilians killed. Last month, the rebels said
they attacked a gold panning camp in the Yahukimo regency,
killing 17 people, and said the victims were members of Indonesia’s army disguised as gold miners, a claim that was denied by authorities.
-- Karmini reported from Jakarta, Indonesia, AP
