Police have arrested the wife and daughter of Alex Manuputty, an exiled Christian leader seeking self-determination for Indonesia's troubled Maluku archipelago, media reports and police said Sunday.
Oly Manuputty and her daughter Christina were arrested Saturday at their home in Ambon, capital of Maluku province, the Jakarta Post newspaper reported.
The arrest came as Pope John Paul II urged Indonesian authorities to restore order in Ambon after a week of Muslim-Christian clashes killed at least 37 people.
Eighty percent of Indonesia's 210 million people are Muslims, but South Maluku's 2 million inhabitants are evenly divided between Islam and Christianity.
The latest fighting began a week ago, when several dozen members of Manuputty's Maluku Sovereignty Front paraded through downtown Ambon - an act some Muslims saw as a provocation.
Manuputty and an associate, Samuel Waileruni, were arrested in 2002 and sentenced to three years in jail for encouraging their followers to hoist banned separatist flags.
Manuputty fled to the United States last year while waiting for his appeal to be heard by the Supreme Court.
Indonesian authorities have banned Manuputty's organization for its campaign for a referendum on self-determination for the province 1,600 miles east of Jakarta.
Manuputty claims the Indonesian justice system discriminates against the Christian minority.
Last year Muslim leader Jafar Umar Thalib - who commanded the army-backed Laskar Jihad militia that killed hundreds of Christians during the earlier conflict - was freed by a Jakarta court where he was being tried for the killings of 13 villagers.