Vaudine England, Jakarta – Residents of the Maluku province capital, Ambon, were burying their dead from the latest outbreak of mob anger and military killing yesterday as violent unrest continued further east in Tual, capital of the Kai Islands.

Hundreds of troops and police patrolled the streets of Ambon and fired occasional warning shots yesterday.

Reports from the remote Kai Islands suggest that the communal violence there, which broke out after the first explosion of violence in Ambon in mid-January, has continued to exact a heavy toll on lives and property.

Between 40,000 and 50,000 people are said to have fled Tual in recent weeks. Although the figures are hard to confirm, both diplomatic and human rights sources in Jakarta are prepared to believe them.

"Yes, it's around that figure," said Marzuki Darusman, head of the National Commission on Human Rights.

The latest violence in Ambon shows that the wounds from two months of killing by Christians and Muslims, which left 200 people dead, are proving hard to heal. A military-brokered peace agreement signed last week was itself preceded by a bomb explosion in the centre of the town.

Army chief of staff General Subagyo Hadisiswoyo was in Ambon on Saturday to inaugurate a new command, only to see his ceremony interrupted by the violence as mobs burned eight houses and damaged cars and buses. When troops opened fire to stop the violence, at least eight people were killed.

The military's ceremony to mark its expanded presence on Ambon coincided with commemorations for the Pattimura Revolt of 1817, a day which has local resonance both for its Indonesian nationalist and Moluccan separatists.

The Torch of Pattimura was, according to tradition, being carried into Ambon on Saturday. Community leaders thought it a good idea to have villagers from the mainly Muslim village of Batumerah – a focal point of this year's violence – pass the torch to predominantly Christian villagers of Mahardika. Instead, the Muslims refused to hand the torch to the Christians and tempers flared.

Significantly, the Ambonese crowd took out their anger on military vehicles, throwing stones and breaking windows, which provoked the soldiers into shooting into the crowd, leaving at least eight dead, all of them Christians.

"What happened in Ambon is only because of a misunderstanding about the Torch of Pattimura, the hero of the Indonesian Moluccas," said Reverend Joseph Pattiasina, head of the National Protestant Church of Indonesia and himself an Ambonese.

"But I think they are cooling down there. They signed a peace agreement [between Muslim and Christian communities] on May 12.

"However, in Tual, things are not cooling down yet," he said, while noting it was very difficult to get information from the area.