Jakarta – Hundreds of people raided a state-owned fish pond in West Javan city of Karawang on Tuesday and got away with 200 kilograms (440 pounds) of newly-harvested prawns worth some 2,500 dollars, reports said Wednesday. Some 500 people were involved in the two-hour raid on the pond, owned by the central government's state secretariat Tuesday.

But police had only managed to arrest 22 people, eight of them small children, the Suara Pembaruan evening daily said. The newspaper quoted police as saying some of those arrested said they wanted to sell the prawns. Others said that because of spiralling food prices in recent months they had been able to eat only twice a day. The owners had harvested the the shrimp only hours before the raid adding that police were on guard there Wednesday.