Death toll hits 142 in riot-torn Indonesian town

More than 140 people have now been killed in a series of bloody clashes between rival ethnic gangs in the Indonesian part of Borneo.

More than 140 people have now been killed in a series of bloody clashes between rival ethnic gangs in the Indonesian part of Borneo.

Clashes between indigenous Dayaks and immigrants from other parts of Indonesia first erupted on Sunday in Sampit.

Many of the dead were decapitated and gangs paraded severed heads around the town.

Hospital official Komaruddin Sukhemi said at least 142 bodies had been brought to local mortuaries with more bodies remaining uncollected on the streets.

Navy officials in Jakarta said two landing craft were due to arrive in the area to take on some of the estimated 15,000 refugees from the conflict.

Frightened residents of Sampit have flooded the central Kalimantan provincial capital Palangkaraya some 130 miles away. Many are sheltering in police stations in the city.

Enmity between the Dayaks and the migrants, mainly from Madura Island, has often erupted into fierce brawls in the region. The fighting is often triggered by land disputes.

Police have arrested 80 people in the past few days, including two local government officials they accuse of inciting the violence.

Hundreds of homemade weapons, including machetes and spears, have been confiscated.

Over the past 40 years, hundreds of thousands of people, mostly Madurese, have been resettled in Kalimantan - the Indonesian part of Borneo. They were moved as part of a government transmigration programme designed to relieve overcrowding in other areas.

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