Jakarta – Some 50 people attacked and looted a shopping centre in Indonesia's East Kalimantan province on the island of Borneo on Thursday after a protest rally turned violent, the official Antara news agency reported.

Antara said panic spread through the city of Samarinda and shops were closed after youths began throwing stones and looting the Eka Raya store and Sumber Sari Mini-Market. "I lost millions of rupiahs today," Predy, owner of the Eka Raya store, was quoted as saying. "They took clothes, shoes and hats from my store. Most of my windows were also shattered."

Witnesses said they presumed the looters were from among around 100 people who had been staging a protest rally at the local legislature where a new governor was being sworn in, Antara reported. It said security officers were sent to deal with the looting, and one military officer was hurt during the rally at the provincial assembly building.

Violence [also] broke out on Wednesday in the North Sumatran town of Gabion, witnesses said, after a dispute over fishing rights. Some 500 fishermen went on the rampage in Gabion, near the port city of Belawan, burning trawlers, warehouses and an office as a dispute about large trawlers encroaching on their territory turned violent. After failing to get a satisfactory answer to their grievances from local politicians, the fishermen attacked a cooperative office which operated several of the trawlers.