Gangs killed at least 26 people in three remote villages in the South Pacific island nation of Papua New Guinea on Friday and left eight villagers missing in the latest wave of violence linked to land disputes and allegations of witchcraft, authorities said.
“It was a very horrific event. As we got closer to the scene we saw children, men and women. They had been killed by a group of 30 young people,” East Sepik province’s acting police commander, James Bogen, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on Friday.
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Bogen said all the houses in the village were burned down and the remaining villagers were too scared to say the name of the attacker and took refuge in the police station.
“Some of the bodies left during the night were carried into the swamp by crocodiles. We have only seen the places where they were killed – their heads had been chopped off,” said Bogen, who said the attackers were in hiding and that no arrests had been made yet.
Chris Jensen, country director for aid group World Vision, said 26 people were confirmed dead, eight were missing and 51 families had been displaced in the Angoram area on the crocodile-infested Sepik river, New Guinea’s longest.
Performers in traditional costumes stand outside the country’s parliament in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, November 16, 2018. At least 26 people were reportedly killed by a group of men in three remote villages in northern Papua New Guinea last week, United Nations and police officials said Wednesday. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
“As is the case in most cases in Papua New Guinea, the trigger appears to be a combination of factors, but witchcraft appears to be one of the triggers, along with land ownership,” Jensen told The Associated Press.
“It’s individuals who are accused of witchcraft, and they’re likely people who control some kind of property or land,” Jensen said.
The attacks took place on July 16 and 18, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said in a statement on Wednesday.
“I am horrified by the sudden outbreak of deadly violence in Papua New Guinea, which appears to be the result of disputes over ownership and use of land and lakes,” Turk said.
Turk said 16 children were among the dead.
“The number could be more than 50 as local authorities are searching for the missing. In addition, more than 200 villagers have been displaced after their homes were set on fire,” Turk said.
The Royal Papua New Guinea Police in the capital, Port Moresby, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday.
East Sepik provincial governor Alan Bird said violence has escalated over the past decade in the diverse country of more than 10 million people, most of them subsistence farmers. Police are under-resourced and rarely intervene, Bird said.
Papua New Guinea is home to more than 800 indigenous languages and has been plagued by centuries of tribal conflict over land. Most of the country’s land is tribal, not private, and has no clear borders.
Conflicts have become increasingly deadly in recent decades as combatants have switched from bows and arrows to assault rifles, and mercenaries are increasingly involved.
Blake Johnson, an analyst at the Australian Security Policy Institute, said while the East Sepik killings appeared to be particularly brutal, “it is not the first mass killing this year” in Papua New Guinea.
“Escalating violence between groups, which often leads to revenge killings, is culturally tolerated at best and encouraged at worst,” Johnson said.
He said law enforcement officers lack the resources and training to police much of the country.
“This country is big, it’s harsh, it’s hard to navigate, and we don’t even know how many people live in these areas,” Johnson said.
Papua New Guinea’s tribal conflict drew international attention in February when a gunfight in Enga province left at least 26 combatants and several bystanders dead.
A landslide in the province in May destroyed at least one village, but ongoing fighting has complicated the emergency response. The government has said more than 2,000 people have been killed, while the United Nations puts the death toll at 670.
Domestic security issues in Papua New Guinea, the South Pacific’s second most populous country after Australia, have become a battlefront in a struggle between China and the United States and its allies for influence in the region.
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Australia, Papua New Guinea’s former colonial power and largest donor, signed a bilateral security pact last year in response to the neighbour’s growing security concerns, but Beijing also reportedly wants to conclude a police agreement with the country.
China signed a secret security pact with Papua New Guinea’s neighbour the Solomon Islands in 2022, including police assistance, raising concerns that a Chinese naval base may be established in the South Pacific.
