by About 26 people have been killed in fighting in the remote highlands of Papua New Guinea, where deadly violence between more than a dozen tribal groups has been on the rise, a senior security official said.
The death toll had previously been reported at more than 50, but that figure was revised by police, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
“These tribesmen have been killed all over the countryside, all over the jungle,” George Kakas, acting superintendent of the Royal Papua New Guinea Police, told the broadcaster. “The police and defense forces have had to do everything they can to quell the situation at their own risk.” His comments left it unclear when the killings had occurred and police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The bodies were found in a field, along roads and near a river, Kakas said. Video footage and photographs shared on social media, whose authenticity could not immediately be confirmed, showed dozens of bodies stacked in the back of an open truck.
Police said as many as 17 tribes were involved in the clashes.
Government estimates suggest that between 9 and 17 million people live in Papua New Guinea, which is largely rural and larger than California, with approximately 85 percent of the population living outside urban centers. It is rich in mineral resources but remains impoverished. Culturally, it is extremely diverse; According to Survival, an indigenous rights group, there are more than 300 tribes spread across the country and the Indonesian border regions of Papua and West Papua. More than 800 languages are spoken in Papua New Guinea.
“From the outside, it will look like they are one country,” said Elizabeth Koppel, a researcher at the National Research Institute of Papua New Guinea, during a panel discussion hosted by the U.S. Institute of Peace on tribal violence in October. “But it’s really hard for us to try to live with each other, to understand each other, given the different diversities.”
For several years, tensions have been rising in the highlands, including Enga province, where the recent deaths occurred. “This type of situation has been getting more and more serious for many years,” said Michael Main, a researcher at the Australian National University. And he added: “It’s been going on for so long that we have an entire generation growing up deeply, deeply traumatized. “This level of violence has become normalized.”
The death toll has risen in recent years as tribes have transitioned from using traditional bows and arrows to high-powered firearms, mostly brought from abroad.
The Papua New Guinea defense force “recognizes that it is fundamentally outmatched,” Dr. Main said.
The problems in the highlands go back many years and are very localized and often very personal, often related to long-standing grievances over land or politics. This is further complicated by a young population that lacks education and employment, and young people are denied education because they are forced to flee the fighting.
“There are people fighting over economic resources, whether it is ownership of the land on which a development project is located or coffee plantations,” Dr. Kopel said in her comments last year. She added: “The law doesn’t intervene quickly enough, so people resort to taking the law into their own hands and sometimes law enforcement instigates fights.”
At least 150 people were killed in clashes in 2023, and last year, authorities locked down Enga province for three months to contain unrest.
Peter Ipatas, governor of Enga, last year asked Australia to help Papua New Guinea security forces contain the violence. “We don’t have the capacity to fix this,” he told the newspaper. The Australian.
Last year, Australia agreed expand support and training for Papua New Guinea police under security agreement. Speaking to the ABC on Monday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia hinted that more aid could be coming to Papua New Guinea.
“We remain available to provide whatever support we practically can to help our friends in PNG,” he said.
