Ulma Haryanto – Police in South Sumatra have named two people as primary suspects over a recent bloody clash in the Ogan Komering Ilir district of Palembang, which left seven people dead.

The clash reportedly involved workers of a private plantation company, Sumber Wangi Alam, and residents of Sungai Sodong village in Mesuji.

After meeting with officers of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), Chief Insp. Gen. Hasyim Irianto said on Wednesday that two employees of the company, identified as 23-year-old T.R. and 25-year-old H.R., have been deemed suspects in the Apr. 21 incident. "We believe, for now, these two suspects initiated the clash," Hasyim said, without elaborating.

Komnas, however has suggested that it was not happy with the way police were carrying out the investigation. Nur Kholis, deputy chairman of Komnas, told the Jakarta Globe that preliminary investigations pointed to clear human rights violations.

Komnas has suggested that the altercation stemmed primarily from a land dispute between the plantation and the villagers that was left simmering and unresolved for years.

Nur Kholis said that he and two other Komnas officers arrived in Palembang on Tuesday and held marathon meetings with administrative leaders and had also met with representatives from SWA.

"We have already found conflicting statements made by the South Sumatra Police and witnesses in regard to the use of firearms in the incident," Nur Kholis said on Wednesday.

He said that police had ruled out the possibility of firearms being used in the incident, but Komnas said witnesses testified they had been used. He also said the bodies of the victims were found riddled with bullet and stab wounds.

According to Komnas, two of the seven dead were villagers and the remainder were SWA plantatation workers. Nur Kholis said that the villagers were killed first and that he speculated an initial clash escalated into a riot resulting in additional deaths.

He said that in interviews with villagers, he found that they had been angered that two of their own had been killed and then they stormed onto the plantation.

"Police need to conduct a proper investigation. We requested them to conduct a second round of autopsies on the victims," Nur Kholis said. He added that according to their investigations, SWA had employed four officers of the police's elite mobile brigade unit as well as several members of Pam Swakarsa, a community-based security organization, to guard their plantation.

Pam Swakarsa groups are normally registered with the police and wear police-issued uniforms but are not allowed to use firearms without having a police-issued gun permit. "The police, however, are now stating that they have nothing to do with security officers guarding the plantation," he said.

[Additional reporting by Antara & Zaky Pawas.]