A series of explosions rocked the district town of Lhokseumawe in North Aceh, as the death toll continued its climb at the end of the first week of a massive government operation to crush separatist rebels in the province.
At least five people were killed or found dead across Aceh by noon Sunday, witnesses and police said, as a delegation of five government ministers arrived to asses the situation.
A soldier was killed in a clash with rebels in North Aceh district shortly after noon Sunday, Lieutenant Colonel Yani Basuki, spokesman for the operation, said on Elshinta radio.
Indonesian police said they had arrested 12 students in a crack-down on separatist supporters during the operation. Aceh police spokesman Sayed Husainy said the 12 students at the State Institute for Religious Sciences were arrested late Saturday along with five private-sector workers. Husainy also said that non-governmental organizations "which so far have claimed to defend human rights" will be monitored.
Aceh has been under martial law since Monday as up to 40,000 police and soldiers confront what the government estimates are around 5,000 rebels from the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), which has been fighting for an independent state since 1976.
Three explosions heard behind the fishmarket in Lhokseumawe around 9:10am sparked panic in the market. Brigadier General Bambang Darmono, deputy chief of the Aceh military operations, told journalists later that the three explosions were caused by bombs dropped from airforce aircraft.
"They were sonic bombs, aimed at demoralizing the enemy, in this case, demoralizing the GAM in the Sawang and Nissam areas," Darmono said. Hundreds of residents living along the city's shoreline fled or were asked by the military to move to a local mosque at the time of the explosions.
Two alleged GAM rebels were shot dead on the eastern edge of Lhokseumawe Sunday. Bullets and a grenade lay next to their bodies on the side of the road. "We had suspected them for a long time," a soldier at the scene said. "When we stopped them, they tried to shoot." Two other bodies were found at separate locations in Aceh Besar district on Sunday, humanitarian workers there said.
Darwis Jeunib of the local GAM command said that he had seen rebels kill one soldier during an attack on a military post in the Bireun district on Saturday. "One soldier was killed, I myself saw it. We fired a rocket," Jeunib told AFP in Jakarta. The military media center could not immediately comment on the report.
Residents of Pantonlabu in North Aceh said that a grenade thrown into the local market injured 11 people, six of them seriously.
Aceh Military Spokesman Navy Colonel Ditya Sudarsono said in Banda Aceh Sunday that 66 GAM members have been killed.
Also on Sunday, two men on a motorcycle shot dead a known pro-Indonesian man while he drank coffee in Aceh Besar, police spokesman Sayed Husainy said.
Sudarsono said that 377 schools have been burned or otherwise destroyed in Aceh so far.
During his visit to Aceh on Sunday, People's Welfare Minister Yusuf Kalla said the government will make available whatever funds necessary to rebuild the burned schools.
Kalla said that foreign non-governmental organizations were barred from entering and operating in Aceh without permit, the Antara news agency said.