The Indonesian military is reported to be engaged in its biggest operation for five months as light tanks and armored personnel carriers pounded a base of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).
Troops were using light tanks and armored personnel carriers against a suspected concentration of GAM rebels in an area 35 kilometers south of the industrial township of Lhokseumawe.
Reports Wednesday said the fighting, on the day a ceasefire was supposed to have begun, involved up to 200 GAM fighters.
Agencies cited military spokesman Lt. Col. Firdaus Komarno as saying the operation was routine, although analysts say the clash marks a new military offensive that appears to be the largest operation undertaken by security forces in Aceh for some five months.
GAM infers military broke the ceasefire
The Free Aceh Movement (GAM) had declared a unilateral ceasefire effective a day before the Muslim Holy month of Ramadhan started Wednesday.
Agence France-Presse quoted Sofyan Dawod, a district commander and Aceh GAM spokesman, as saying the rebels were surrounded by forces who have sealed the area and put the rebels under siege. Dawod said the rebels were forced to defend themselves. thus inferring that the military had broken the truce and not GAM.
Earlier Wednesday police said they had seized a weapons cache and arrested a suspected rebel following a search of a bus Tuesday afternoon. Confirming the incident Aceh police spokesman Muhammad Joenoes said the haul consisted of 25 guns, including AK-47 rifles, and 300 rounds of ammunition.
Blow to peace prospects
The clash south of Lhokseumawe, long known as a base for GAM, shattered what earlier had been said to be high hopes for a peace process brokered by the Henry Dunant Center (HDC).
Senior Indonesian officials including Coordinating Minister for Politics and Security Affairs Susilo Dambang Yudoyhono had said there was confidence that the talks scheduled to start in Switzerland over the weekend would succeed.
GAM accused the Indonesian government of announcing an agreement prematurely, saying it needed more time to consider, though it could see the signing of an accord by December.
More than 10,000 people have died in the conflict since 1976, when GAM began fighting for an independent state in the energy-rich province on Sumatra Island, with more than 1,200 civilians dead this year alone.