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Rebel leader warns of reprisals if military fires at supporters |
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June 9, 2000
SUVA, Fiji, JUNE 8 (AP) - In another sign of rising tension among Fijian coup leader George Speight's supporters, a police officer was savagely beaten Thursday and briefly detained at parliament where gunmen are holding 31 hostages. While many of the 300 people still camped inside the parliamentary compound three weeks after six gunmen stormed it and took Fiji's government hostage are calm and peaceful, a group of about 40 young men remain on a knife edge and apparently liable to explode into violence at the least provocation. The victim of Thursday's beating, an ethnic Fijian policeman, visited parliament to pick up a taxi stolen last week, Speight said. For
unknown reasons, the officer was attacked by dozens of Speight's
supporters who kicked and punched him even as he lay on the ground. After
the beating, rebels hosed the victim's blood off the road where he fell.
The officer was then detained for about an hour until an unarmed army major negotiated his release with rebels. A police spokesman could not be reached for comment.
A former Fijian lawmaker who visited the hostages Thursday told the country's TV1 network that they were tired and homesick but were being well looked after. "They were very tired," George Shiu Rau said. "They were very well - very well kept, very well fed."
The incident came the day after Speight warned the military of serious reprisals if soldiers shoot at his gunmen.
That threat came after a burst of automatic gunfire shattered the morning calm around Fiji's parliament complex, where the rebels are holding the hostages - including deposed Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry.
The
army, which took control of the Pacific island nation last week
and has set up roadblocks around parliament, said a soldier fired one
warning shot over the heads of four rebels who were breaking into a house near parliament.
The
shot was returned by at least two bursts of automatic weapons fire
from within the compound, witnesses said. No one was injured. Speight
and his rebels are demanding more power for Fiji's indigenous majority.
Chaudhry
is the first prime minister drawn from the 44 percent of the
Fiji's population who are ethnic Indian. The rebels want Fijians of Indian
descent barred from leadership of this nation 3,620 kilometers (2,250 miles) northeast of Sydney, Australia.
Talks between Speight and the army broke down Saturday after military leader Commodore Frank Bainimarama said he would entertain no more of Speight's demands. Bainimarama already agreed to scrap the 1997 constitution and oust Fiji's president.
Speight claimed Thursday he was "just about to let the hostages go, when the army intervened."
He says he now is holding onto his hostages to ensure an ethnic Fijian interim government - and not the army - is appointed to steer Fiji back to democracy.
Speight also said the Commonwealth, an organization of Britain and its former colonies, had a terrible history of dealing with issues of indigenous rights.
A four-man Commonwealth delegation is due in Fiji possibly as early as Friday to seek an end to the crisis, but it was not clear if the team planned to meet Speight. The Commonwealth has suspended Fiji from its councils in retaliation for the government crisis.
"The Commonwealth is littered with double standards over the last number of decades with regard to ethnic interests," Speight said.
Also Thursday, a man appeared in court in Suva charged with three counts of attempted murder in the May 27 shootings of an Associated Press Television News cameraman and two soldiers during a gun battle between rebels and troops.
The man did not enter a plea and was remanded in custody pending a future hearing, TV1 reported. Further details were not immediately available. |