Jakarta – Indonesia's chief security minister, on a fact-finding mission to Aceh province, said the government wanted to end a separatist war there peacefully but at the same time he issued a tough warning to the rebels.

Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said hard-line elements in the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) would be crushed if necessary, the official Antara news agency reported on Wednesday.

In a reminder of the tension gripping Aceh, troops shot dead six GAM members including a woman rebel during a raid on Wednesday in the province's east, the military said.

Yudhoyono flew to Aceh on the northern tip of Sumatra island on Tuesday. The results of his week-long trip will be key to policies the government is drawing up on Aceh and which Yudhoyono has said could involve scrapping peace talks with the rebels and imposing martial law.

"We want to find a solution to Aceh which does not result in a waste of life. We hope this good intention elicits a sincere response from GAM," Antara quoted Yudhoyono as saying soon after he arrived in the province.

However, Yudhoyono said creating peace would take tougher security steps. He did not elaborate, but said if necessary, hard-line GAM elements would be crushed, Antara said.

The government expects to decide its stance early next month, and has won support from parliament for tough action but drawn criticism from human rights activists for its mounting rhetoric over GAM, which has been fighting for independence for 25 years.

Analysts have said a week of tough talk from the government – including the public labeling of GAM as a terrorist group for the first time last Thursday – showed Jakarta believed military action was the only solution to the conflict.

Army operations have been carried out regularly in the past year and clashes with rebels and other acts of violence linked to the war occur almost daily, often resulting in civilian deaths.

Two years of peace talks in Switzerland with the rebels have proven largely fruitless in stopping the bloodshed.

Many of Indonesia's political elite are still chastened by East Timor's decision to break away in a 1999 referendum, and are loathe to show leniency to rebels in Aceh, or Indonesia's other separatist hotspot, Papua province in the country's far east.

Rebels wounded

In Wednesday's raid, the military said it suffered no casualties and also wounded four rebels.

"Around 50 men from our squad raided a rebel stronghold this morning. In the operation, six armed separatists were shot dead," said Zainal Mutaqin, a military spokesman in Aceh. "One of the dead was a female fighter." A small number of women serve in GAM's armed wing.

Political analysts have said that by branding GAM a terrorist group, the government might try to link the fight against it to the international war on terror. The government has denied that.

No reliable death toll has been published for Aceh this year, but the International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank said some 2,000 people were killed in 2001, most of them civilians.

Life a misery

Because of recent violence blamed on GAM, Yudhoyono said many people questioned the use of talks with the rebels.

He said any imposition of civil or military emergency was not the main objective of the government, whose primary focus was to halt a conflict that has made life a misery for Acehnese.

Activists expressed dismay at the government's hard line. "What we have here is [the government] fighting violence with violence and at the same time blaming the Aceh problem entirely on GAM," said Hendardi, director of the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association.

Ibrahim Ambong, head of parliament's commission on defense and international affairs, backed a tough approach. "The commission is of the opinion that if dialogue has not given us results there should be firmer action in the form of a civil or military emergency," he said.

A military emergency, or martial law, would place the army commander in Aceh in charge of the province. Civil emergency is one step down, but still gives wide powers to local authorities. Aceh's people have long complained of abuses by GAM but their strongest criticism has been directed at the security forces.