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JAKARTA, June 4 (AFP)-The capital of Indonesia's westernmost province of Aceh and surrounding areas were calm on Sunday, the third day of a truce between the government and the opposition group. "Banda Aceh and the Aceh Besar districts have been calm for the past few days. I have heard no reports of violence," said a journalist in the provincial capital Banda Aceh. The government and opposition group signed a "humanitarian pause" in Geneva on May 12 aimed at reducing tension and violence in the restive province, where an opposition Muslim group has been fighting for an independent Islamic state since 1976. The truce came into effect on June 2. The Antara news agency and other media have reported the appearance of Acehnese flags in the capital and its surroundings since the truce took effect. In Lhokseumawe, the main town in North Aceh district, Indonesian security personnel took the Acehnese flags down, residents said. "The humanitarian pause has no relevance to whether Aceh is independent or remains under its current status," Aceh police chief Brigadier General Bahrumsyah Kasman said, according to the Media Indonesia daily. "What is clear is that we should not be provoked or politicized by that matter," he added, commenting on the opposition group flags. Meanwhile, Antara reported that 117 Indonesian army soldiers arrived by ship at the Malahayati harbor, 36 kilometers (22 miles) northwest of Banda Aceh on Saturday. "They are not reinforcements but will replace TNI (National Defense Forces) troops who have left this region," said Police Colonel Suyitno, head of the Aceh task force. He said the soldiers had arrived on a navy warship from Palembang, South Sumatra, adding that although they were from an infantry battalion, they would be placed under police command in Aceh. Reports reaching here Sunday said that unidentified men burned down some 100 houses built to settle local Acehnese migrants on Saturday, the day after the truce came into effect. Antara news agency said that the houses in Luengputu, in the Bandar Baru subdstrict of Pidie, were still under construction and had been intended to house local poor and homeless families. Aceh, rich in oil and gas, is an Islamic province of some 4.6 million people on the northern tip of Sumatra island; [opposition] has been fuelled by Jakarta's failure to ensure the province benefits from its resources, and by years of harsh military repression aimed at wiping out the Islamic opposition group. The violence has claimed more than 400 lives this year alone, at least 32 of them since the signing of the truce. |
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