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CATHOLIC
CHURCH DIOCESE OF AMBOINA
AND
CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN MOLUCCAS
Secretary Office. Imam Bonjol No. 8, Ambon‑97127, Phone.
354079
Ambon, April.29.2002
Re. Save Our Selves
To His Excellency
Mr. Koffi Annand
The General Secretary of the United Nation
Dear Sir,
This is an SOS call from us, the
Churches in the Moluccas Islands. There have been series of fresh
attack again directed towards the Christians in the Moluccas. The
previously condition was a little better after a peace agreement
was signed by representatives from Christian and Moslem
communities and by the Central and local Government. But now under
the pretext of fighting the RMS separatists, which actually a very
small group of people, who do not even have weapons, the innocent
Christians are under constant attack again. The condition is
becoming worse because the local government is seriously unwilling
and unable to settle their authority to handle the provocation of
both the FKM Group (who uses the RMS symbols and raised the RMS
flag since the 25'l' of April until now ) and the Jihad warriors
(Moslem warriors ). From the outsten, the Churches in the Mollucas
are not committed on both these political and ideological ideas of
both of them. Yet, The Mollucan Agreement in Malino is not
implemented in a consistent and responsible way by the Government.
On the 3d April a high explosive bomb exploded on the Christian
side of town, killing 7 people and wounded 56 people. After that 2
people were found dead also without knowing who killed them.
Subsequently, on the 25 and 28 of April the unfinished
reconstructed building the Silo Church was burned with no reaction
from the security forces, which where on guard around the place,
the Silo church building was burned down in 1999 and erected
again. A mortar was also fired to the Christian suburb of Karang
Panjang the city of Ambon, and heavily wounded 2 women. At the
down of Sunday morning a Christian traditionally village, called
Soya, on top of the hill on the southern park of Ambon island, was
attacked killing at least 12 people, including a 3 year's old
child, a 7 month's baby,_ and several women, it has also left 9
people wounded. A some of 26 houses and a historical old church
building were also burned down. This village has so far been used
by the government for the IDP's from Ambon and some of these
victims are among the dead ones.
We have to call on you, for there have been various attempts done
internally and nationally but to no avail. The armed forces and
the police could not do much. Last Friday, they were belittled by
the head commander in Chief, Mr Jafar Umar Talib, in ftont of
thousands of Moslems in a rally, which took place at the Alfatah
Mosque, with no reaction from their side. So far, the terrorism
that have caused many lives among the innocent and ordinary people
has not been handled properly by the armed forces and police. So
far, we cannot expect any security from them.
Therefore, we do urge the United Nations on behalf of the
civilized families of nations to do something, by means of
assisting our government to stop any further massacre in order to
strengthen the Universal Principals of Human Rights as
acknowledged by the Second Amendment of the Indonesian
Constitution, and in turn to combat against terrorism in our
beloved country. The United Nations is our only hope now. Please
save us from this trial.
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