Indonesian police Tuesday reported another mass killing in the turbulent province of Aceh, the second this month.
The bodies of nine people who were abducted late Saturday were found buried at Langsa in East Aceh on Monday, said district police chief Commissioner Gaguk Sumartono.
Sumartono said the nine had been abducted by 20 armed rebels from the separatist Free Aceh Movement (GAM). The local GAM spokesman, Ishak Daud, accused the military of having kidnapped the victims during one of their sweeps.
The coordinator of the East Aceh Human Rights organization, Muhammad Yusuf Puteh, said the abductors were in camouflage dress.
The site of the grave is near where 31 plantation workers were massacred on August 9. The military and the rebels blamed each other for that slaughter.
GAM has been fighting for an Islamic state in Aceh on the northern tip of Sumatra since the mid-1970s. More than 1,200 people have been killed this year alone, most of them after military authorities in April launched a new offensive.
New President Megawati Sukarnoputri has promised a fresh approach relying more on dialogue. A delegation of cabinet ministers and security chiefs is due to arrive in the province Wednesday to assess the situation.
Top security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, among those who will visit Aceh, on Tuesday raised the possibility of fresh peace talks with the rebels but said certain "rules of the game" must be laid down.
"There will be no spying, no gathering of information about the activities of either the TNI (the Indonesian military) or the government and no misuse of protection that is accorded them (rebel negotiators)," Yudhoyono was quoted by Antara news agency as saying.
He reiterated that the government would release six rebel negotiators detained in July and August as long as "they were not implicated in any other charges".
The six were held following the breakdown of peace talks between the two camps in Geneva in June.
Yudhoyono's spokesman said the security minister flew to the North Sumatra provincial capital of Medan later Tuesday and would fly to Banda Aceh early Wednesday.
In other reported violence an Aceh military spokesman, Major Dimyati (eds: one name), said two suspected rebels were shot dead at Geulumpang Tiga in Pidie district on Monday evening. A local GAM spokesman, Abu Razak, said they were farmers killed during a military sweep.
A homemade landmine blew up at Syamtalira Aron in North Aceh on Monday, killing one teenager and wounding another after their motorcycle hit it, residents said.
Police said they arrested 178 suspected rebels from Aceh during a raid on an isolated training camp in the neighbouring province of North Sumatra which left four dead.
National police spokesman Inspector General Didi Widayadi said firearms and ammunition, grenades and homemade bombs were confiscated at the camp at Pulaukampai, a coastal marshy area close to the border with Aceh.
He said four people were shot dead for resisting arrest. The camp was used to train GAM members and supporters in combat skills, the spokesman said.
North Sumatra's chief detective, Iskandar Hasan, was quoted by Media Indonesia daily as saying that after questioning, police freed 173 people because they had not engaged in criminal activities. Five with criminal records in Aceh were detained -- BANDA ACEH, Indonesia, (AFP)
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