Jayapura – A student was beaten to death in custody here Friday, bringing to four the number of people killed in retaliation for an attack on Indonesian police in the troubled province of Irian Jaya, the victim's fellow students told AFP.
Ori Dorongi, 19, a student from the central highlands' Nduga tribe, died in custody at 2am after repeated beatings by police, Notun, a fellow student from the Ninmin dormitory said. "He was bashed and died in the police cell," Notun said.
Dorongi was one of 99 people, at least 50 of them students, arrested by police in the hours following Thursday's attack on a marketplace on the outskirts of the capital Jayapura, in which two policemen and a security guard were killed and several shops set on fire.
Enraged police immediately swooped on several dormitories in the hills above the marketplace housing hundreds of students from the central highlands.
Crack troops stormed the dormitories, beating students with rifle butts, shot and chased students fleeing through gardens on the slopes behind, and barged into private homes in search of those hiding, witnesses said.
Police have admitted killing three people in the process, shooting one dead and killing two others with "other methods." Neighbours and students witnessed police stab two male students after dragging them from the Imi dormitory and beating them until their faces were "totally destroyed" at dawn on Thursday.
"I saw them throw the students into the police truck and stab them in both sides of the waist with bayonets," resident Fred Nobay told AFP. Still lying in the morgue of Jayapura General Hospital on Friday were two bodies, beaten beyond recognition, with stab wounds in their waists, medical staff said.
Armed police raided Imi dormitory, three kilometres uphill from the Abepura market, again on Thursday night, rounding up and beating 21 people including the neighbourhood (RT) head Yopi Koirewoa, witnesses said.
"Police hiding behind the wall pounced on us as we emerged from the dormitory to survey security at 10.30pm," Koirewoa told AFP. "They kicked and beat all of us in the face with rifle butts ... and forced us into their truck. They made us lie on the floor so we couldn't be seen."
Rachmat Marsuara and a fellow neighbour, emerging from their homes after hearing cries for help, were surrounded by police and forced to the ground at gunpoint. "They made us crawl along the ground for 25 meters as they kicked me in the back. The commander asked us what our business was. From our crawling position we told him 'You've got the RT in the truck, let him go.' They let him go and took off," Marsuara told AFP.
"Blood was pouring from all our faces," Koirewoa, a heavily bandaged gash above his eye, said. "They had us stretched out on the ground as they kicked and stuck rifles in our necks, like we were no longer human beings."
Provincial police chief Brigadier General Sylvanus Wenas and Sihombing denied police had made any further raids or arrests overnight. "We only conducted patrols," Wenas told AFP, saying police were still holding 62 people arrested yesterday for questioning.
However police at the Abepura police station on Friday admitted they had rounded up more than a dozen people in an overnight raid. "We took about 15 people from a place up the hill about three kilometers from the marketplace last night," a Brimob policeman told AFP.
Police have blamed Thursday's attack on hardline independence fighters from the central highlands. Asked why police were holding so many students, Brigadier General Wenas replied "Whether they're students or not is of no interest to us."
Deputy Jayapura police chief Assistant Superintendent Alex Sambe told journalists Thursday he believed students had given the orders to kill police.