More gunfire at Freeport’s Indonesian mining operations; 2 policemen shot

2 police wounded in new attack near Indonesia mine

JAKARTA, Indonesia — Gunmen fired at police near the gold mining operations of U.S. company Freeport in the Indonesian province of Papua on Wednesday, wounding two officers, official said.

Wednesday’s incident was the fifth shooting in as many days along a road between the town of Timika and Freeport’s Papuan gold and copper mine. The attacks have killed three people and wounded nine.

Freeport ordered its staff to stay off that road Wednesday, preventing hundreds of workers from returning to the mine, said Mindo Pangaribuan, a spokesman for the Indonesian subsidiary of Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold, Inc.

One of the officers hit Wednesday was in critical condition, said police and military officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not permitted to talk to media.

Papua police chief Bagus Ekodanto said one policeman had been admitted to a hospital, but he could provide no further details.

A 29-year-old Australian, an Indonesian security guard and a policeman died in ambushes over the weekend in the same area where an attack in 2002 killed two American teachers.

Police have been searching for the attackers in the jungle around Freeport’s sprawling Grasberg complex, the world’s largest gold mine, which employs 20,000 people. No arrests have been made.

A Freeport vehicle also came under fire on Tuesday afternoon, but no one was hurt.

Papua, a desperately poor mountain province, lies some 2,100 miles (3,400 kilometers) east of the capital, Jakarta. It is home to a 40-year-old insurgency that denounces Freeport as a symbol of outside rule. Many activists are resentful because Freeport earns billions of dollars in profit from Papua’s natural resources.

Local media, however, have quoted rebels as denying involvement in the shootings, and Indonesian officials and experts doubt whether the rebels have the organization or unity to mount coordinated attacks.