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Indonesian army keeping pressure on rebels

An Indonesian journalist drinks snake blood during a jungle survival lesson at Sanggabuana mountain in Subang, West Java Province on Wednesday. Sixty-four Indonesian journalists gathered for a four-day course which is mandatory for those who hope to be embedded with the Indonesian military during operations against rebels in Aceh province. PHOTO: REUTERS

Indonesian troops fired artillery and moved hundreds of villagers from their homes during an attack yesterday on a suspected separatist rebel base, a local resident said.

The resident heard rounds fired throughout the morning towards a hilly area in Juli sub-district just south of Bireuen town. The private RCTI television station also showed pictures of artillery being fired.

About 1,000 residents of Juli were moved from their homes yesterday morning on military, police and private vehicles, the resident said.

The evacuees, some carrying clothes and bedding, were taken to Cot Gapo village east of Bireuen where tents had been prepared for them.

The armed forces on May 19 launched a major operation aimed at wiping out separatist rebels of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).

The military has said it hopes to separate residents from the rebels.

Violence in Aceh has left at least seven more people dead over the past two days, residents and the military said.

Two armed men wearing balaclavas shot dead a religious teacher, Muhammad Yusuf Daud, 45, on Wednesday night at Peuraden village in Bireuen district, a local resident said.

Daud was inside the village worship hall teaching youngsters about the Koran when two men called him outside. They talked for a while and then shot him in the chest and head, the resident said.

Two of the pupils were Daud's children, who fainted at the sight of their slain father's blood, the resident said.

Official military figures mid-week put at 175 the number of rebels killed, along with 24 soldiers and four policemen, since the military operation began. The military has put the civilian death toll at 18.

Humanitarian workers said they found four more corpses with gunshot wounds in separate locations Thursday in the Peusangan and Jeumpa areas of Bireuen.

A military spokesman, Captain Anang, said a Kopassus special forces soldier and a GAM rebel were missing after an incident off the coast of South Aceh Thursday.

Four Kopassus soldiers had arrested a pair of GAM rebels who tried to flee by boat, Anang said. As the soldiers brought their captives back to shore in a boat one of them shoved a soldier and both fell overboard, he said. Their whereabouts are unknown.

The three other soldiers were then forced to shoot dead the other rebel who also confronted them, Anang said.

Another rebel was shot dead separately during a raid by troops in Singkil district on Thursday, Anang said. Troops seized two pistols.

Citing the hostilities, the US State Department warned that "American citizens are strongly urged to avoid traveling to Aceh and those already present should leave immediately."

Press reports in Jakarta yesterday said the military has given American journalist William Nessen two days, starting from Thursday night, to get away from GAM rebels with whom he is believed to be travelling.

After that time his safety cannot be guaranteed if a firefight occurs, the military said.

Troops who said they were investigating reports of rebel activity, shot dead a German tourist in Aceh on June 4.

The long-running conflict has also taken a toll on local government, a report yesterday said.

Mohanto Aki, a senior Home Affairs Department official, quoted by the Detikom online news service, said that of 5,082 villages in the province, 1,034 no longer have a functioning local government and another 1,615 do not function as they should.
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