Jakarta – A joint team of the Indonesian Military (TNI) and the National Police shot dead an apparent member of an Intan Jaya-based armed criminal group (KKB) for allegedly resisting arrest in Nabire regency, Papua on Monday. The deceased has been identified only as NM, 35.
At the time of the shooting, the team was at the location because they suspected that an arms trade was to be conducted somewhere in the area.
"It is indeed true that an [alleged member of the] KKB Intan Jaya was arrested in Nabire on Monday. However, NM fought back so we have to immobilize him and he died after succumbing to his bullet wound," a spokesman for the Papua Police, Sr. Comr. Ahmad Kamal, said on Wednesday as quoted by Antara news agency.
Ahmad explained NM and several others were driving in a car from Nusi Beach to Nabire when the police-TNI team blocked their passage and fired a warning shot.
The spokesman said that while NM's companions ran into a hilly area, NM fought against the officers, causing them to shoot him in the waist to immobilize him.
The police learned NM's identity from an ID card found alongside a homemade weapon and two bullets, Kamal said.
He added that NM held a position as the general operations commander in the MEPAGOO Kodap 29 area, in which he had a strategic role controlling KKB activities around the Intan Jaya area.
Moreover, police claimed NM also supplied food, weapons and ammunition for KKB in the area. The authority suspected that he was in Nabire to purchase weapons and ammunition, which he was to later send to Sugapa, Intan Jaya.
For now, NM's body is being kept at the morgue in the Nabire Regional Hospital. (dpk)