"Red Code Warning on Freeport Mine - Papua""Freeport Security Guard Check All Car's In After Shoots Action"
The police secured the road to Freeport McMoran’s mine in Mimika on Sunday afternoon, after a shootout that last hours with unidentified gunmen who had attacked vehicles on the main road and killed one security guard working for the mining giant and injured five others. On Saturday (July, 11 2009), unidentified assailants shot at a vehicle at Mile 53 in Kuala Kencana district, killing Drew Nicholas Grant of Australia who worked for Freeport. Following attacks on Saturday and Sunday, the police had built security posts at Miles 51 and 53, where two separate attacks occurred over the weekend. Papua Police chief Brig. Gen. Bagus Ekodanto said the police had brought in reinforcements to Mimika, binging a total of 420 officers to secure the area following the fatal shooting. For security reasons, the police said they would escort all vehicles coming down from Freeport mines to the Kuala Kencana housing complex or the town of Timika, and vice versa. The police will also guard housing complexes in Kuala Kencana district and Tembagapura, where expatriates working for Freeport live. Bagus said the police would continue to hunt down the attackers, whom he suspected came from rebel camps. Papua is home to a low-key separatist rebellion seeking independence from Jakarta. The rebels have also denounced Freeport as a symbol of Jakarta's rule. The weekend killings come amid an escalation of violence in the region in recent months that has left several security personnel dead. Two Americans were killed in an ambush in 2002 near Freeport's Grasberg operations.
Author: Markus Makur, The Jakarta Post
