VIOLENCE SPREADS IN BORNEO AS FIVE MALAYSIAN POLICE KILLED
ReutersMarch 3, 2013, 7:09 pm
LAHAD DATU, Malaysia (Reuters) - Gunmen have killed five policemen in Malaysia's Sabah state where members of an armed faction from the Philippines have been facing off with security forces as they stake an ancient claim to the remote corner of Borneo island.
Police on Friday tried to end the standoff with scores of followers of the sultan of Sulu, a south Philippine region, who occupied a Sabah village in February to press their claim. Two policemen and 12 followers of the sultan were killed.
The killing of the five policemen late on Saturday, in an ambush on police hunting followers of the sultan, will reinforce fears that insecurity is spreading in a region rich in resources that has been of increasing interest to investors.
Malaysia's inspector general of police, Ismail Omar, tried to ease any worries on Sunday, saying the situation was under control.
"I don't want speculation that Sabah is in crisis," Ismail told a news conference in the town of Lahad Datu. "We have our security forces at three places to respond."
The confrontation had threatened to reignite tension between the Philippines and Malaysia. Ties have been periodically frayed by security and migration problems along their sea border.
Economic interests are also at risk.
Oil majors like ConocoPhillips and Shell have poured in large sums to develop oil and gas fields in Sabah. Chinese companies have been investing in hydro-power and coal mining.
Much of Borneo's forest has been cleared, to the horror of indigenous people and environmentalists, and replanted with palm oil. Tens of thousands of migrants have come to Sabah from the Philippines to clear the timber and work the plantations.
For generations Borneo, one of the worlds' biggest islands, was a forbidding expanse of jungle, thinly populated by head-hunting tribesmen, and claimed by Muslim sultans and later European colonialists based in coastal trading towns.
"DRASTIC ACTION"
Colonial Britain and the Netherlands carved up the island in the nineteenth century and Malaysia and Indonesia took their shares upon independence. Britain agreed to independence for the tiny oil-rich sultanate of Brunei on Borneo's west coast.
But under a pre-colonial pact between sultans, Sulu, in what would later become the Philippines, was awarded control of the northern corner of Borneo, in what would later become Malaysia.
A British trading company agreed during colonial times to pay Sulu a nominal lease for Sabah - it now amounts to 5,300 ringgit ($1,700) a year - and the claim of the ancient Sulu sultanate on Sabah was all but forgotten, until February.
Then, about 150 followers of the Sulu sultanate, which has no power but commands respect in the southern Philippines, sailed in and occupied a Sabah village, staking their claim and demanding a renegotiation of Sabah's lease.
Malaysia has said the demands will not be met and has sent in the security forces. Both Malaysia and the Philippines have called on the gunmen to give up and go home.
An increasingly exasperated Malaysian prime minister, Najib Razak, who faces an election in weeks, has promised "drastic action" if the group does not leave.
The trouble looks to be at least partly the result of efforts to forge peace in the southern Philippines, in particular a peace deal signed between the Philippine government and Muslim rebels last October to end a 40 year conflict.
Jamalul Kiram, a former sultan of Sulu and brother of the man Philippine provincial authorities regard as sultan, said the peace deal had handed control of much of Sulu to Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) rebels, ignoring the sultanate.
The sultan loyalists had gone to Malaysia to revive their claim to Sabah as a protest in response to what they saw as the unfair peace deal, he said.
A senior Malaysian defence official said the gunmen in Sabah had links with a Philippine rebel faction leader called Nor Misuari, who also saw no benefit from the pace deal.
"He will surely stir up more trouble," said the Malaysian official, who declined to be identified. ($1 = 3.0905 Malaysian ringgit)
(Reporting by Niluksi Koswanage in KUALA LUMPUR; Additional reporting by Manuel Mogato in MANILA; Editing by Robert Birsel)SEVEN KILLED IN FRESH CLASHES IN MALAYSIAN BORNEO
AFPUpdated March 3, 2013, 6:57 pm
LAHAD DATU, Malaysia (AFP) - Five Malaysian policemen and two gunmen died in a fresh clash on Borneo as fears mounted that violence linked to a deadly standoff with Filipino intruders had spread to other areas, police said Sunday.
The shootout late on Saturday in the town of Semporna followed a firefight the day before between Filipino followers of a self-proclaimed sultan and Malaysian security forces that left 12 intruders dead along with two police officers.
The new clash in Semporna, 300 kilometres (190 miles) from the site of the three-week standoff, occurred when police were "ambushed" by gunmen during a security sweep, Malaysia's national police chief Ismail Omar told reporters.
An estimated 100-300 Filipinos have been surrounded in a farming village by a Malaysian police and military cordon since landing by boat from the nearby Philippines on February 12 to insist the area belongs to their Islamic leader.
The leader, Jamalul Kiram III, 74, claims to be the heir to the Islamic sultanate of Sulu, which once controlled parts of the southern Philippines and the Malaysian state of Sabah on Borneo.
Malaysian media also quoted Ismail saying that police were pursuing yet another group of armed men in Kunak, another town in the area.
The fresh developments have sparked Malaysian fears of a possible wider campaign of violence by supporters of the group in Sabah, which has large numbers of Filipino immigrants, both legal and illegal.
Officials issued calls for calm as some stores in the region reported panic buying of goods.
"I am calling for cooperation and assistance from local leaders to tone down the sentiments and numerous rumours on what is happening in Sabah," the state's chief minister Musa Aman was quoted saying by Malaysian media.
Earlier Sunday, Sabah police chief Hamza Taib was quoted as confirming the latest clash was linked to the ongoing seige in the village of Tanduo, which is hours away by road. Reports provided no further details.
Ismail said, however, it remained unclear whether there was any link.
The situation is a highly delicate one for the Southeast Asian neighbours.
The Philippine government is looking to consolidate recent progress in mending fences with Islamic separatists in its predominantly Muslim south.
Muslim-majority Malaysia, meanwhile, could face pressure at home for taking harsh action against the Islamic intruders.
Following Friday's initial firefight, Malaysian police threatened "drastic action" to clear out the trespassers.
Philippine President Benigno Aquino, who has sharply criticised the intruders, also urged them to surrender unconditionally.
But Kiram's spokesman, Abraham Idjirani, repeated on Sunday that his followers would not budge.
He added the sultan would seek US intervention, citing a past agreement with Washington, which controlled the Philippines in the early 1900s.
"(Malaysia) want to hide the truth, that they do not own Sabah. It is owned by us," he said.
US embassy officials in Manila were not immediately available to comment.
The standoff has embarrassed Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak -- who must call elections by June -- by exposing lax border security and fuelling perceptions of lawlessness and massive illegal immigration in Sabah.
His long-ruling government was already on the defensive over allegations that in the 1990s it gave citizenship to possibly hundreds of thousands of illegal Filipino and Indonesian migrants in Sabah in exchange for their votes.
The Sulu sultanate's power faded about a century ago but it has continued to receive nominal payments from Malaysia for Sabah under a historical lease arrangement passed down from European colonial powers.
Kiram's people are demanding Malaysia recognise the sultanate owns Sabah and share profits from economic development in the state.
Invited by umno to take residence in Lahad, related to umno local reps, incorporated into felda Lahad, Malaysian IC carriers likely.....and still trying to point fingers at the opposition.
ReplyDeleteRakyat not bodoh lah, jib!
Ketuanan lanun Vs Ketuanan samseng.
ReplyDelete