Padang – About 2,000 angry villagers attacked an Indonesian palm oil plantation, burning down all the buildings at the company's base camp, reports said Monday.

The attack on the PT Tri Argo Adhiniaga (TAAN) company in the West Sumatra district of Limapuluh Kota, some 120 kilometres (75 miles) north of here took place on Saturday, district police chief Lieutenant Suhardi Sigit said.

Attackers from the nearby village of Mangilang burned a security post and the gate of the palm oil plantation on the main highway linking West Sumatra to neighbouring Riau province. The mob then went to the base camp some three kilometres into the plantation, wrecking wooden bridges along the way, and burned several buildings at the camp, including housing for soldiers deployed by the authorities since September. The some 40 soldiers stationed there were forced to leave the premises by the crowd. "All remaining buildings there were burned down and all (palm oil) seedlings in the nursery were ruined," Sigit said. Sigit said villagers were angered by statements made by TAAN president Saleh Ismail on television on Saturday which labelled them as "destructive and irresponsible," he said.

He said the villagers were also angered because the company continued to operate despite a suspension order by West Sumatra Governor Muchlis Ibrahim on October 7. Ibrahim temporarily suspended the company's operating permit pending settlement of a drawn-out dispute between the company and the villagers.

The villagers claim the company was not only felling forests in the region but also dumping the waste from the felling into the river. Villagers, who rely on the river water for their daily needs, have been complaining of serious skin irritation.

The attack was the fifth on the TAAN plantation. In the previous attack on October 3, two people were injured. In September, thousands of villagers attacked the base camp, damaging and burning vehicles and buildings there, prompting the deployment of the soldiers.