Indonesians Burn Chinese Shops

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30130, 14 May 1963, Page 10

Indonesians Burn Chinese Shops

(N.Z-.P. A.-Reuter—Copyright) DJAKARTA, May 11. Indonesian youths burned and smashed Chinese shops in Bandung yesterday and set fire to 15 cars. Troops broke up the rioters, firing shots in the air. A curfew was imposed at night, and the Army posted guards.

Later reports said rioting had spread south to Tjipanas and Tjipajung near Bogor, 38 miles south of Djakarta, where gangs of Indonesian youths burned and looted Chinese-owned shops last night and this morning. A spokesman said Djakarta’s 5000 battle police had been alerted for a possible spread of violence to the capital. Reports last night said two Chinese-owned shops had been set on fire and others ransacked by gangs of Indonesian youths during anti-Chinese demonstrations in the port of Tegal, Central Java province, earlier this week.

The rioting is the second fiare-up of aniti-Chinese feeling in Javanese towns in the last two months. In ‘’March, Indonesian youths wrecked Chinese houses and shops at Tjire-, bon, West Java, after a Chinese magistrate imposed a heavy sentence on an Indonesian in a local civil court action. The last major clash between Chinese and Indonesians was in 1959 when the Government ordered all Chinese retail traders in rural areas to shift to major towns in a move designed to “Indonesianise” the pattern of Indonesian commerce. The Chinese, who up till then had been permitted to bear joint Indonesian and People’s Republic of China citizenship, were called on to choose one or the other. A bitter propaganda war between Indonesia and China followed, and thousands of Chinese left the country in Chinese and Russian ships. Later the situation quiet'ened, and Indonesia and China signed a friendship agreement.