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Chief of the Papua Provincial Police Inspector General Mathius Fakhiri has confirmed that an armed separatist group set fire to a number of houses in .
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JAKARTA, April 6 (Reuters) - One mid-February morning in the central highlands of the Indonesian province of Papua, the army said Prada Ginanjar Arianda, a 22-year-old member of the 400 Banteng Raiders commando battalion, was shot in the stomach by separatist fighters and died.
About 24 hours later, after a sweep by security forces through nearby hamlets that sent hundreds of residents fleeing to the safety of two churches, distraught family members were at a health clinic collecting the bodies of three brothers, Janius, Soni and Yustinus Bagau.
Ever since Papua was incorporated into Indonesia after a United Nations-supervised vote by only about 1,025 people in 1969, Indonesia has tried to quell a rebellion among its distinct Melanesian indigenous population of about 2.5 million who are seeking independence. Papua, rich in resources, has among the worst poverty rates in Indonesia despite $7.4 billion of funding by the central government over the past 20 years.