Jakarta – Indonesian troops killed 15 suspected rebels in Indonesia's Aceh province, and guerrillas set fire to a passenger bus, an army spokesman said Wednesday.

The rebels from the Free Aceh Movement were killed Tuesday in separate clashes in northern and eastern Aceh, said Lt. Col. Asep Sapari. The troops also confiscated two boats and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, Sapari said.

Sapari said rebels in eastern Aceh Monday torched a passenger bus on its way from North Sumatra to the provincial capital of Banda Aceh. He said a group of about 15 rebels stopped the bus, ordered the 28 passengers off and then set it on fire.

Three of the passengers were taken hostage by the rebels, he said.

A spokesman for the Free Aceh Movement couldn't be reached for comment. It is impossible to independently verify military claims about Aceh, because journalists are barred from most of the province.

In May 2003, Jakarta abandoned an internationally mediated peace plan and launched a military operation aimed at crushing the insurgency. More than 2,000 people have been killed in the region since then.

Human rights groups accuse the military of operating death squads in the province, and claim many of the victims killed are civilians caught in the fighting.

At least 13,000 people have been killed since 1976, when the Free Aceh Movement began fighting for an independent state in the oil-and-gas rich province on the northern tip of Sumatra.