At least 26 people were slaughtered and three villages burned in Papua New Guinea, the second such attack this year.
As early as January 2024, there was also looting and deadly violence in Port Moresby, the capital of Papua New Guinea Photo: Andrew Kutan/afp
BERLIN taz | A massacre in northern Papua New Guinea killed at least 26 people in an attack on three villages. The fact that this became known outside the violent Pacific state is thanks to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk. The Austrian’s office in Geneva, briefed by UN staff in Port Moresby, issued a statement on Wednesday Explanation away. “I am shocked by the shocking outbreak of deadly violence in Papua New Guinea,” Turk said.
The background is apparently disputes over land and sea ownership and use rights. The UN said the death toll could rise to over 50 as authorities continue to search for missing people. In addition, many residents have been forced to flee after attackers set fire to their homes.
The attacks on the remote villages of Angrumara, Tambari and Magendo in the Angoram district of East Sepik province took place on Tuesday and Thursday last week, according to the newspaper, according to East Sepik acting police chief James Baugen The national. It is believed that 33 men from three neighbouring villages, armed with guns, spears, machetes and slingshots, are responsible for the murder of at least 26 men, women and children. Some of the women and girls had previously been raped. The village of Tambari was completely burned down.
Photo: info text
Rotten and eaten by crocodiles
According to Baugen, police and doctors did not arrive until the weekend. Bodies were already decomposing and those near bodies of water may have been eaten by crocodiles. Two survivors were asked to leave the area, all the others fled. One survivor explained loudly The national: “It was a surprise attack and we were helpless.”
Some villagers fled in canoes after hearing gunfire, but they were pursued and some were killed. One woman survived by clinging to a floating log for three hours. Papua New Guinea’s largest river, the Sepik, flows through the province and empties into the Bismarck Sea.
According to Baugen, the police wanted to start an investigation on Wednesday, but that would be complicated by a shortage of gasoline. He gave no information about the background or motives of the perpetrators.
Already the second massacre this year
The massacre is the second major attack this year by assailants from neighboring villages. In February, at least 26 men were killed in fighting between ethnic militias in Enga province in the central highlands. Most of the victims were believed to have been on their way to a nearby village to avenge the murder of a woman and were ambushed.
Papua New Guinea, located northeast of Australia and a German colony until 1914, has about 300 ethnic groups with 10 million inhabitants and is still largely a tribal society with age-old conflicts. In the poor agricultural province of East Sepik alone, with about 450,000 inhabitants, there are said to be 90 local languages.
Conflicts over land and resources
Conflicts over land and access to resources have worsened as the population has grown, more than doubling since 1990. As automatic firearms have replaced spears and bows and arrows, the number of casualties in conflict has also risen dramatically.
The state is weak and can barely pay its police. When many police officers mistook an alleged computer error in the payment of their salaries for a drastic pay cut and spontaneously went on strike last January, this led to protests in the capital Port Morresby. mass lootingThe result was 16 deaths and a government crisis.