Security Tightens After Shoot-Out with Muslim Extremists in Indonesia

Security in Indonesia has tightened after 11 people were killed in a shoot-out during a hunt for Muslim extremists. It is believed that several of the suspects are related to reported anti-Christian attacks in Poso.

An additional 200 paramilitary police reinforcements, from two additional companies from the elite Brimob unit have now been deployed to Poso to "enforce the security", the local deputy police chief said at the end of a ceremony for an officer who died in the shoot-out, AFP has reported.

The shoot-out took place while the police officers were carrying out an operation of tracking down the extremists on January 22.

24 people were arrested, while another eleven were killed during the operation, the national police spokesman Sisno Adiwinoto told the local reporters in Jakarta.

None of those arrested or killed were civilians.

Adininoto added that one of the suspects who was killed, as well as two others who were arrested, were wanted in connection with a series of anti-Christian attacks in Poso.

Another six other people were also injured during the shootout.

Local police seized 21 homemade firearms, seven guns, 21 improvised bombs, 406 detonators and more than 3,000 rounds of ammunition during the operation.

Poso, in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia, is an area that has seen tragic bloodshed during the sectarian war involving the Muslim and Christian communities over the period between 2000 to 2001. More than 1, 000 people died during the violence.