Asian Games: Indonesians damage Palembang venue
PALEMBANG: Irate Indonesian football fans ripped plastic seats from the stands and hurled them onto the pitch at a stadium scheduled to host the Asian Games next month, an official said Sunday.
A league match between Sriwijaya FC and Arema FC ended in chaos Saturday afternoon when the fans tore up seats at the Gelora Sriwijaya Stadium in Palembang on the island of Sumatra.
Pictures showed multi-coloured chairs strewn across the outer edges of the ground, which is bordered by an athletics track.
“We are very upset with the supporters who ruined the seats in Gelora Sriwijaya during the game,” Rusli Nawi, the stadium’s security supervisor, said.
“I’ve been here for 10 years... there has never been damage to the seats like yesterday.”
The stadium had been renovated for the Games, which are being held in Palembang and the capital Jakarta from August 18-September 2. Indonesia has been scrambling to prepare venues, finish building work, widen roads and ease traffic congestion.
Some 335 seats were damaged, about half of which will have to be replaced with seats ordered from outside Indonesia, Nawi said. Police have arrested four people over the rampage, which was started by Sriwijaya fans upset at their team’s 3-0 home loss, Nawi said.
No one was injured. About 11,000 athletes and 5,000 officials from 45 Asian countries will compete in the Games, the world’s biggest multi-sports event after the Olympics.
PROBE ORDERED
JAKARTA: Human rights groups called for an independent investigation on Sunday, after Indonesian police shot dead 11 men earlier this month as part of a security clampdown ahead the Asian Games.
Jakarta police has said that it shot 52 people suspected of street crimes, killing 11, and arrested hundreds over July 3-12.
Amnesty International Indonesia researcher Bramantya Basuki said the shootings echoed Brazil’s anti-crime operation before the Rio Olympics in 2016, when rights activists accused police of tampering with crime scenes to make it appear that its officers had come under attack.
“We need to have an independent, effective investigation to make sure that this pattern is not used in Indonesia,” Basuki said. Jakarta police spokesman Argo Yuwono said they had acted according to standard procedure and had only shot suspects who were “a danger to officers or to other people”