JAKARTA, Indonesia - At least eight people were killed in religious fighting which broke out in Indonesia's ravaged spice islands after a bomb exploded in the main city of Ambon, a church official said on Monday.
The fighting erupted on Sunday in a predominantly Christian area of Ambon, some 2,400 km (1,300 miles) east of Jakarta and one of the focal points of the religious violence which has plagued the islands for more than two years.
"Eight people were killed in the fighting," Semmy Wailerunny, a lawyer for the Communion of Churches, an umbrella group of non-Catholic Christian organisations, told Reuters.
An official from the Al Fatah foundation, a major Muslim organisation in the spice islands, denied Muslims provoked the clash.
"We also heard the explosion so we came out to guard our areas," said the official, who did not want to be named.
The long-running conflict in the islands, also called the Moluccas, erupted over a petty squabble between a public transport driver and a passenger in January 1999.
The conflict has killed thousands of people and forced tens of thousands to flee to neighbouring parts of Indonesia.
A south Jakarta court on Monday declared illegal the arrest of Jafar Umar Thalib, a leader of a militant Muslim group.
The court also ordered the police to pay a fine of one million rupiah.
Large numbers of militants under Thalib's command sailed to the Moluccas last year and have been accused by church groups of fomenting violence in Christian strongholds.
It is unclear how many remain in the Moluccas.
The Moluccas is home to roughly equal numbers of Christians and Muslims.
Around 90 percent of Indonesia's 210 million people are Muslim.
05:51 05-21-01
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