Jakarta – The military in Indonesia's Maluku islands, where more than 300 people have died in the past two weeks, has begun seizing weapons and arresting suspects in a fresh bid to pacify warring Muslims and Christians.
"The operation to seize weapons is continuing," Second Private Abidin of the Maluku military command told AFP on Monday from the main city of Ambon.
"We have also arrested several people for possession of firearms," he said, but refused to disclose the number of residents rounded up.
The operation, which includes house to house searches, was launched on Sunday by the military, which is now in charge of reestablishing law and order in Ambon. Ambon was calm Monday but tension remained, Abidin said.
Maluku military chief Brigadier General Max Tamaela said three standard Indonesian military firearms and scores of home-made weapons and bombs were confiscated in the first raid on Sunday.
"Two of the standard weapons were guns and the other one is an SS1 rifle," Tamaela was quoted as saying by the official Antara news agency. The operation included house to house searches, he added.
Rahman, a member of the Muslim Al Fatah emergency post, said the Muslim side would be willing to surrender their weapons provided the security forces guarantee their security.
"What happened in the past was that as soon as we surrendered our weapons the Christians attacked us," Rahman said.
"We want peace but they [Christians] have always breached agreements," he charged, echoing similar complaints of bias on the Christian side. Tamaela said that in further raids troops seized 52 homemade rifles, 12 homemade handguns, 22 makeshift bombs, one standard military handgrenade, uniforms of the military police and police and more than 150 rounds of ammunition.
Several people were arrested, including one policeman, Tamaela said without giving more details. The troops also cleared several main streets of makeshift barricades set up by rival Muslim and Christian groups.
The Indonesian military on December 29 took over responsibility for security in Maluku, known as the Spice Islands under Dutch colonial rule, as the wave of deadly Muslim-Christian clashes there showed no sign of abating.
The military leaders have said that the transfer from police control now allowed security forces to "use repressive measures," including house searches, random checks, arrests and weapons' seizures.
They have however denied that the imposition of such measures amounted to a civil emergency, a rung lower than a declaration of martial law.
A year of bloody conflict between Muslims and Christians in Maluku has left 1,134 killed, over 2,300 injured and more than 8,500 buildings, including more than 122 places of worship, either damaged or burned.
The clashes, which erupted on January 19, 1999 on the island of Ambon and have since spread to at least five other main islands in the province, once noted for its religious harmony.
The violence has also forced tens of thousands of people to flee their homes and seek refuge in local military installations or in other Indonesian regions.
Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid was quoted Monday as warning foreign countries aginst getting involved in the country's trouble spots, including the Malukus, Irian Jaya and Aceh.
"I warn other countries against (giving) any kind of support, such as sending weaponry to promote the establishment of a country within the Unitary State of Indonesia," the president was quoted by the Indonesian Observer as saying.
The Netherlands late last year offered assistance in helping to stem the rising bloodshed in the Malukus, and last week parliament speaker Akbar Tanjung ruled out any deployment of UN peacekeeping troops to restore peace there.