Papua Police Chief Claims Tembagapura Situation Is Controlled

Papua Police Chief Claims Tembagapura Situation Is Controlled

Papua Police Chief Inspector General Paulus Waterpauw said the number of Tembagapura District residents had fled to Timika City, Mimika Regency, Papua, around 1,700 people. Thousands of residents were displaced because they were worried because of terror carried out by the Armed Criminal Group (KKB).

"Approximately 1,700 of Tembagapura took to Timika. That was a long time ago last week," Paulus said, Tuesday (3/24).

The refugees are still in Timika. Paulus himself claimed the situation in Tembagapura at this time could be controlled. But the former North Sumatra Police Chief was reluctant to explain the current situation in Tembagapura, including the development of the case of the burning of the Indonesian Gospel Camp Tent Church in the Sinai Church in Opitawak Village.

"While we can handle it all, I'm focusing on Corona first," Paulus said.

Mimika Deputy Regent, Johannes Rettob, previously said that in the last few days a wave of evacuation of residents from four villages in the Tembagapura District to Timika continued. And now more than 1,000 residents are in Timika.

"The local government really hopes this situation will end soon. An appropriate solution must be taken so that the security situation in Waa, Banti, Kimbeli, Opitawak and Utikini can recover. We don't know how long it will take for the situation in Tembagapura to return to normal as before. "Johannes said, last Monday (3/9).

He revealed that thousands of Tembagapura District residents asked to be evacuated to Timika because the security conditions in their hometown did not guarantee the community could survive.

"People certainly feel scared, threatened, traumatic. If they stay there, they have difficulty getting basic necessities. For activities such as going to pan or not, they ask the government together with the military and police and PT Freeport Indonesia to facilitate them to go down to Timika, "he said.

With such conditions and situations, practically all services in the fields of education, health, and others are also totally paralyzed. Even for the education sector, school-age children in Kampung Banti and its surrounding areas have long (around three years) no longer received education since their school facilities (SD Negeri and One Roof Banti State Junior High School) were burned by the KKB around February 2017.