Family shot and burned in WHP

A ONE-year-old child, her mother and father were shot dead, thrown into their house and burnt last week during a violent ethnic clash in the Baiyer Lumusa district of Western Highlands.
The family was attacked by warring tribesmen from an enemy tribe as they were coming out of their house in the morning.
The enemies surrounded the house where the family was and ambushed them as soon as they came out of the house.
The family’s tribesmen confronted the enemies after the family was killed and a fierce fight broke out which saw the death of five other men on both sides the same morning.
This tribal fight, which saw the use of sophisticated firearms, has claimed the lives of 18 people over the past two weeks since the fight intensified between two large tribes in the Lumusa area.
Properties and domestic animals as well as food gardens worth thousands of kina have reportedly been destroyed.
While the Lumusa local level government president Patrick Lepa was tightlipped on the issue, the church groups and local peace and good order committee have worked tirelessly to contain the fight but to no avail.
Certain leaders from the Lumusa area have called on the law enforcing agents like the police to intervene and stop the tribal fight which is slowly spreading and might affect the whole of Lumusa.
Waipa Kote, a policeman from Baiyer, confirmed the fight and deaths and said funding and logistic constraints were hindering police from going into the battlefield to stop the fight.
Lumusa peace and good order committee team headed by chairman Maku Lunga had not gone into the battlefield to stop the fight because the warring tribes were using guerilla tactics to ambush each other.