Jakarta-- Security forces opened fire during fresh battles between Muslims and Christians in the strife-torn Indonesian city of Ambon Friday leaving at least 21 dead and more than 100 wounded, residents said.

Ten Muslims, including an army soldier, were killed and 50 wounded by shots fired by police mobile brigade troops, said Malik Selang, an official at the Muslim Al-Fatah mosque.

"They [the Christians] burned empty houses and accused us of being the perpetrators," Selang told AFP by telephone. The bodies and the injured Muslims were taken to the Al-Fatah hospital in Ambon, he said.

A local journalist who visited the state Dr. Haulussy hospital said by late afternoon the death toll among the Christians had risen to 11 after some died in hospital from their injuries.

Six Christians were killed instantly when soldiers deployed in the city had opened fire on the crowd, he said. "All of the victims, those killed and wounded, were shot by troops," the journalist said.

A woman manning an aid post at the Maranatha Protestant church said 60 Christians were wounded by gunshots. They were being treated at a local Christian hospital. "Some of them may be dead, but I don't know exactly," said the woman, who refused to give her name.

The clashes flared when 28 homes were set on fire, the journalist said. Selang said Christians from the Mardika area threw gasoline bombs at empty houses belonging to other Christians to create the impression that Muslims were setting the fires.

But the woman at Maranatha said the Muslims launched the first attack against Christian residences in the morning, helped by soldiers armed with grenades. Hani Laetemia, a male nurse at the Maluku Protestant Church Hospital said 11 victims were brought to the hospital but they had been transferred to the state Dr. Haulussy hospital.

"One of the victims died here," he said, adding he could still hear shots being fired in the city. The state hospital could not be reached by telephone.

The city was gripped by tension as gunfire echoed through the streets into the late afternoon, the journalist said.

Scores of elderly women, whose houses were gutted in the violence, went to the headquarters of the provincial military command to protest the military's failure to protect their property, he said.

"They cried all the way but the commander would not come out," he said referring to the chief of the command, Brigadier General Max Tamaela.

But an official at the military command said the situation in the city was under control as security forces from the army, air force and police moved to contain the clashes.

"We don't know how many were injured or killed because we have not received a report from the field," Captain Didi Suwandi told AFP.