MANOKWARI: Thousands of people in Indonesia’s West Papua province set fire to a local parliament building on Monday in a protest sparked by accusations that security forces had arrested and insulted students from neighbouring Papua province, officials said.

The angry mob torched the building and set fire to cars and tires on several blocked roads leading to a seaport, shopping centres and offices in Manokwari, the capital of West Papua province, Vice Gov. Mohammad Lakotani said.

“The city’s economy has been paralysed by the demonstrators,” Lakotani said. “Negotiations between protesters and the authorities are currently underway to end the riots.” Television footage showed orange flames and gray smoke billowing from the burning parliament building.

An insurgency has simmered in Papua since the early 1960s, when Indonesia annexed the region, a former Dutch colony. In recent years, some Papua students, including some who study in other provinces, have become vocal in calling for self-determination for the province. Residents of West Papua are ethnically similar to those in Papua.

Protesters also destroyed parts of an airport in Sorong, another city in West Papua province, local police chief Mario Christy Siregar said.

He said rioters broke windows and burned some belongings, but security forces were able to secure the facility and the incident did not disturb airport activities.

Lakotani said the demonstration in Manokwari was triggered by allegations that police had arrested and insulted dozens of Papuan students in their dormitories in the East Java city of Surabaya a day earlier.

Police stormed the dormitories in Surabaya, Indonesia’s second-largest city, on Sunday after Papuan students staying there refused to be questioned over allegations that they had intentionally damaged the national red-and-white flag in the dormitory’s yard.

East Java police spokesman Frans Barung Mangera said 43 students were detained but released hours later after no evidence was found that they had damaged the flag.

Amateur video showing police, backed by soldiers, calling the Papuan students “monkeys” and “dogs” circulated widely on the internet, sparking anger in Papua and West Papua.

Published in Dawn, August 20th, 2019