INDONESIAN police said today armed rebels had gunned down seven civilians when they opened fire on a gold mine in the eastern region of Papua.

Authorities said assailants fired shots at mine workers yesterday afternoon in the remote, mountainous Yahukimo district.

Police said The West Papua Liberation Army (TPNPB) separatist group led by Egianus Kogoya was behind the shootings.

“We will chase the perpetrators and we will take legal action against the separatists and Egianus Kogoya,” Faizal Ramadhani, head of Cartenz Peace Taskforce, a special group formed to handle the Papua separatists, said in a statement today.

He said a police unit sent to retrieve the bodies and rescue survivors was fired on by the rebels.

“As soon as we arrived at the location, our personnel were attacked and the gunfire lasted one and a half hours,” he said.

Seven bodies have been retrieved from the location while 11 other people were rescued alive, police said.

Most of the dead were migrants from the South Sulawesi region.

The rebels also burned down excavators, lorries and the workers’ camp, police said.

The rebels claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying that they had warned the migrants to leave the region and all Papuan areas.

“(Indonesia) must immediately open a negotiation with the Papuan nation to find a solution,” said the group’s spokesman Elkius Kobak in a statement.

The group is also responsible for the February 2023 kidnapping of a New Zealand pilot from the Papuan highlands.

Papua refers to the Indonesian region in the western half of New Guinea island, which is made up of six provinces.

The region has seen several deadly attacks linked to the insurgency in recent years.

Ten people were killed in July last year when a group of rebels attacked a truck full of civilians transporting goods.

In March last year, eight telecommunications workers were shot dead while installing communications towers in Puncak district. – AFP, October 17, 2023.