Hundreds of Indonesians angered by the overnight executions of three Christians rioted in eastern Indonesia on Friday, looting, throwing rocks and torching an official's home, reports said.
ATAMBUA (Indonesia): Hundreds of Indonesians angered by the overnight executions of three Christians rioted in eastern Indonesia on Friday, looting, throwing rocks and torching an official's home, reports said.
Fabianus Tibo, Dominggus da Silva and Marianus Riwu were shot by police firing squad in religiously-divided Central Sulawesi province overnight, triggering condemnation from the Vatican and international rights groups.
In Atambua in East Nusa Tenggara province, stone-throwing mobs smashed windows and furniture at the state prosecutor's office before heading to the residence of the chief prosecutor that they set alight, the Detikcom news agency reported.
A policeman told ElShinta radio that the police chief, bishop and other religious leaders had headed to the streets to urge calm and clear road blocks set up by the executed men's sympathisers.
"Now around 1,000 people have been directed to a field to listen to the bishop," Dedy Warata said.
"There have been casualties but it is still unclear how many and what their conditions are," he said, adding that several police posts had been damaged by the mob and some shops damaged and looted.
Police contacted there declined to immediately comment.
Unlike most of the world's most populous Muslim nation, East Nusa Tenggara is a majority Christian province. The executed trio was born on Flores Island, a part of the province.
Authorities in Indonesia went on alert ahead of the executions on Thursday night, with beefed up security mainly focusing on Central Sulawesi province.
More than 1,000 lives were claimed there in the unrest of 2000-01 that was largely ended by a government-brokered peace deal. Intermittent violence has however persisted since then.
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