M

ore than 1,300 people have been taken hostage in two villages in Tembagapura, Mimika regency, Papua, by an armed group.

The civilians — local Papuans and people from other provinces — have been prohibited from leaving Kampung Kimberly and Kampung Banti, the two villages controlled by the armed group, which security authorities call an armed criminal group (KKB).

“They cannot leave their villages because of the KKB,” Papua Police spokesman Sr. Comr. AM Kamal said on Thursday.

The group dug up some of the roads and placed rocks on others to prevent people from entering or leaving the villages, he added.

Villagers in the area — who are mostly traders and small-scale gold miners — have stopped their activities because of intimidation.

“Economic activities have been disrupted. Some people closed their kiosks, stopped selling goods and curtailed their mining activities,” Kamal said.

Kampung Kimberly is a small village of about 300 residents, mostly from outside Papua such as Java, Bugis and Makassar (both in South Sulawesi) and Buton in Southeast Sulawesi.

While the nearby Kampung Banti houses about 1,000 people from Papua.

Mimika deputy regent Benyamin Bassang said the armed group had intimidated both Papuans and non-locals.

He described the intimidation and the group’s hostility toward civilians, especially non-Papuans, as unexpected because the group was initially friendly toward them.

They have allegedly burned kiosks, raped girls and fired shots into the air to scare civilians.

The situation in Tembagapura heated up two weeks ago when an ambulance belonging to United States mining giant PT Freeport Indonesia was shot at.

The offices of the Tembagapura Police also came under fire on Oct. 29, forcing the Papua Police to declare an alert in the area.

National Police chief Gen. Tito Karnavian said more police officers had been deployed to Papua to rescue the hostages and to stabilize the area. There are about 1,000 police and military personnel deployed in the region.

Security officers are hunting down the perpetrators, he said.

Tito described the group as an “old player” that often extorted money from illegal miners near the PT Freeport facility.

“The hostages are actually miners who are being used as human shields,” Tito said.

He added that the group was small, made up of between 20 and 25 members.

“They only have about five to 10 guns, but they use hit-and-run tactics,” Tito said.

The Indonesian Military (TNI) commander, Gen. Gatot Nurmantyo, said the military was cooperating with the police to conduct surveillance of the assailants.

“We need to act carefully because they are holding civilians hostage.

“Our first priority is to keep the local residents safe through a soft approach in cooperation with the police,” he said.

Gatot added that the Papua Police and the Cendrawasih Military Command in Papua would establish a joint team soon to address the threat posed by the armed assailants.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) researcher Andreas Harsono said it was unclear who this group was and that calling them criminals or assailants only complicated matters in Papua.

He said that in order to understand what was going on, Papua should be viewed within a bigger picture, taking into account all problems including reports of human rights violation as well as the marginalization of local Papuans.

Andreas said in order to have a comprehensive view of the problems in Papua, the government should first allow researchers, including foreign journalists, access to the province.

“We need an independent monitor to verify the situation,” he said.