Jakarta – Indonesian security forces killed a suspected separatist rebel and wounded another in the latest armed skirmish in Aceh province, a local newspaper reported on Friday.

The exchange of gunfire between rebels and security forces lasted for 30 minutes on Thursday in the Matangkuli area of North Aceh, the Banda Aceh-based Serambi daily said.

No troops were killed or wounded in the skirmish, North Aceh police chief Lieutenant Colonel Syafei Aksal told the daily.

The shooting broke out as a patrol of 12 soldiers on six motorcycles encountered a van accompanied by eight men on a motorcycles in Matangkuli, some 33 kilometres southeast fo Lhokseumawe, the main town in North Aceh district.

A spokesman for the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), Ismail Syahputra, said that two civilians were killed in the incident but said that no rebels had been killed or injured in the shootout. "Two people became martyrs. But they were not GAM members. They were just ordinary residents," he said.

Aceh, a resource-rich region on the northern tip of Sumatra, has been wracked by clashes between Indonesian troops and guerrillas of GAM, which has been battling for an independent Islamic state since 1976.

More than 300 people have been killed this year, including both civilians and members of the security forces.