by Eriko Uchida
29 October 1999
Mainly Javanese and Sulawesian transmigrants and the indigenous people of Maluku clashed again in October 1999 in eastern Indonesia, burning houses and a mosque and killing many people, including members of the military. The continuing violence, mainly aimed at the transmigrants forced by the Indonesian government under Soeharto to settle in Maluku, was renewed in early October.
The violence on October 4 resulted in the burning of houses and a mosque and the killing 15 people, including a soldier, the military and witnesses said. The slain soldier, a lieutenant, was shot in the head en route to disperse the clashes that began at dawn that day in the town of Ambon, said military spokesman Lt. Col. Iwa Budiman.
"It is still not clear whether he was shot by another soldier or an armed civilian," Budiman said. Selang Malik, a volunteer at a hospital within the main Al Fatah mosque, said the bodies of six transmigrants were brought to the clinic, along with three injured people. Witnesses said eight other bodies, believed to be indigenous people, were taken to the state-run Haulusy Public Hospital and the Christian GPM hospital. Most of the victims had been shot, although some were stabbed to death. Sporadic shots and explosions of bombs were heard in the area later in the day.
The new clash caused tensions in other parts of Ambon, the capital of Maluku, an Indonesian province known as Spice Islands during Dutch colonial rule. More than 1,500 people have been killed in the conflict that broke out in January in Ambon, 2,315 km northeast of Jakarta, and spread to other islands in the province, mainly inthe Kairatu District of Seram Island.
The violence stems from a simmering anger among the province's indigenous people who have literally been shouldered aside by the Indonesian government's continued settlement of mainly Muslim people from Java and Sulawesi to the province as part of Indonesia's continuing and controversial transmigration program. The program has two purposes-to try to reduce the population on the other overcrowded islands of Indonesia, rather unsuccessfully since it was implemented in the 1960s, and to Javanize the eastern region of Indonesia, whose islands are colonies of a de facto Javanese empire. Indigneous people have reduced rights and have lost their traditional rights to land, water and other natural resources in favour of the transmigrants, hence the increased violence once Soeharto's despotic and brutal rule crumbled apart in May 1998.
Riots Continue in Maluku
The week-long riots during the first week of October between transmigrant people and indigenous people in Ambon, the capital of Indonesia's Maluku province, spread to the Haruk Saparua Islands on October 8, leaving one killed and six others injured. Most of the victims were shot by troops or were injured by hand-made bombs and sharp weapons. The clash broke out early that week after a civilian was shot dead. One day later, some security personnel led transmigrants to civilian houses in Batu Merah Dalam in Ambon, which prompt further riots in the region.
As of October 8, Antara reported, the widespread violence in the eastern Indonesian province had claimed 27 lives and others injured since the beginning of October 3.
Maluku Governor Saleh Latuconsina urged Maluku police Col. Bugis Saman and Chief of the Military Command Brig. Gen. Max Tamaeiland to determine which security personnel used their guns to shoot civilians.
Other clashs the same day in another bout of violence killed at least four people and injuring more than a dozen others, including four soldiers. Local police chief Lt. Col. Gufron said the four were killed by gunshot wounds in a clash in Ahuru, on the southern outskirts of Ambon. Police the same day also found the bodies of five other victims, believed to have been stabbed to death during an earlier clash in Ahuru, said Gufron.
Two More Killed in Ambon Unrest
Two more people were shot dead on October 13 in fighting between indigenous people and Moslem transmigrants in Ambon. These clashes occurred near the airport just outside Ambon city. The airport was closed the day before and roads connecting the port city were blocked by armed groups.
Eight killed in fresh violence
At least eight people were killed in a fresh outbreak of transmigrant-indigenous people violence in Maluku province, hospital and military officials said on October 22. Eight others were injured in the conflict that began two days beforein Saparua, an island south of the Maluku capital of Ambon, said Yohanes Paranuan, a doctor at a public hospital there.
Three people died from gunfire by security officers, while the other five fatalties were the result of homemade bombs, the hospital said. Brigidiar General Max Tamaela, chief of Maluku military, confirmed the violence between Muslims from the transmigrant town of Sirisori Islam and indigenous people from neighbouring villages that continued through early on October 22.
"But we have not yet received a detailed report on the incident," Tamaela said from Ambon.
Another Dies, Dozens Wounded in More Clashes
One person was killed and dozens wounded in fresh clashes in the devastated Molucca islands, the official news agency Antara said on October 26. Battles were fought with crude home-made bombs, rifles and bows and arrows in Kairatu on the island of Seram the day before the agency said.
One of the biggest tasks facing new President Abdurrahman Wahid is to soothe separatist and religious violence across the archipelago, the world's fourth most populous nation. He assigned responsibility for the Moluccas, the spice islands of old, to new Vice-President Megawati Sukarnoputri.
Moluccas Look to Dutch in Separatist Cause
Twenty-five years after activists supporting independence for Indonesia's Moluccan islands hijacked a train in the Netherlands to gain recognition, the spice islands are back on the Dutch political agenda.
Although East Timor's vote for independence in August and the ensuing violence soaked up world attention, the Netherlands -- Indonesia's former colonial power -- has kept silent about clashes on Ambon, the capital of the Moluccan islands.
Fighting between indigenous people and groups of transmigrants sent to live in the Moluccas on Ambon began in January and hundreds of people died in the violence, which also created 30,000 refugees who are in camps on the island. About 100,000 others left to return to Sulawesi and Java. Economic problems and the forced transmigration from other areas are among the reasons why peaceful relations between Christians and Moslems have been disrupted, aid organisations say. A group of 40,000 Moluccans, living in exile in the Netherlands for almost 50 years, is now asking for support from the country which ruled them until 1949. There was an independent country of the Republic of the South Moluccas or RMS. (Republik Maluku Selatan), but it was brutally invaded by Indonesia and incorporated as one of Indonesia's provinces.
"We want the Dutch government to step up humanitarian and economic aid. East Timor is very much in the picture, but in parts of the Moluccas terrible things are happening," said Augus Tuparia, leader of the Dutch-based Moluccan Barduan freedom party (BP).
Dutch Debt
The Dutch are hugely indebted to Moluccan soldiers, whom they recruited as the core of their colonial army a century ago. Moluccan soldiers fought alongside the Dutch against Indonesia during a 1945-1949 battle for independence, which Indonesia eventually won. In 1950, the Moluccans rose against the new Jakarta-based government in a failed attempt to proclaim the Republic of the South Moluccas. They were an independent state for nearly nine months. Thousands of RMS soldiers fled to the Netherlands for fear of repercussions, and the Dutch now stand accused of abandoning them.
"The soldiers and their families were taken to former concentration camps by the Dutch government under the promise they would return to a free Molucca after six months," said the BP's Tuparia. But Indonesia'a annexation of the spice islands was already a fact and many Moluccans settled in Dutch villages outside the camps in the Netherlands. Most of them live there to this day.
In 1975, in a dramatic attempt to draw attention to their separatist cause, six young RMS activists ambushed a train in the Netherlands on December 2 and took hostages. Three hijackers were killed and three have completed their jail sentences for the incident, which lasted nearly two weeks. The tragedy highlighted the need for dialogue and so the Moluccans in the Netherlands set up the IWM, a body representing the various parties involved in the Moluccas. Their hopes for the islands' future are modest.
"There's zero chance RMS will gain power (on the Moluccas). We are just asking for a clear standpoint from the Dutch government out of courtesy for the first generation," said IWM's Christine Nanlohy. The group's priority is the welfare and safety of the people on the Moluccas, and it is trying to help the people there by lobbying for economic and humanitarian aid, she said.
"So far the Dutch role regarding the situation on the Moluccas has been rather timid," she said.
Dutch Move for European Union Resolution
The Dutch government knows of the desire for an independent South Moluccan state, but does not support it. Foreign Minister Jozias van Aartsen has insisted the responsibility for peace and security on the Moluccas lies with Jakarta.
"The current situation on the Moluccas is too fluid for judgement, but we will continue to support political reform in Indonesia with our EU partners," he wrote in a recent letter to parliament. Pressure within parliament is building for the government to adopt a stronger position. In early October, opposition member of parliament Hanja Mai Weggen endorsed a resolution, which the IWM presented to her Christian Democrat party, condemning the violence on the Moluccas.
"The Dutch government is trapped diplomatically because it has to deal with sovereign states. It turns to a heavyweight like the EU to show it cares," said Nanlohy. She added that she hoped the resolution would attract international recognition for the situation on the Moluccas.
On October 17, a delegation of Dutch Moluccans met with the Indonesian government for the first time since the failed proclamation of the South Moluccan republic on 25 April 1950.
The issue of greater independence in Indonesia's 17,000 islands is a major issue for newly elected President Abdurrahman Wahid, with economic recession and political instability fuelling separatism. The Moluccans hope their own call will be heard.
"We cannot decide on independence for the people on the Moluccas, but we (BP) do recognise that there are separatist manifestations on the islands," said Tuparia.
"The developments of the last two years are creating more hope," he said.