Ambon, Maluku
Ambon is the largest city and the main port of the island of the same and also the capital of the Indonesian province of Maluku. The city is filled with 275 888 inhabitants ( 1990), one of the largest cities in eastern Indonesia. By 2000 there were here again and again to serious clashes between Christians and Muslims.
Ambon has an airport and is the seat of government Pattimura University and the private Protestant Christian University of Maluku.
History
Ambon was colonized by the Portuguese in 1526, who used Ambon as an important base for the lucrative spice trade in the Moluccas. The Portuguese were replaced in 1609 by the Netherlands as a colonial power, which, except for a brief British rule in the early 19th century to the 20th century exercised the power to govern. The Dutch built here Fort Victoria, which protected the village, whose inhabitants were divided into orang burger, the Dutch citizens, and orang negri, indigenous population. Also, Arabs, Chinese and some Portuguese occupied in the city, which enlarged the Dutch naval base.
1942 conquered the Japanese Ambon. After their expulsion it came to the independence movement against the Dutch, which ended in the sovereignty of Indonesia. Soon, however, a resistance movement developed in the Moluccas against the new centralist government of Indonesia. An independent state, the Republic Maluku Selatan, was proclaimed, but was able to Jakarta the rebellion in 1950 to suppress by force within a few weeks.
Religious unrest
Christian- Muslim clashes that began on 19 January 1999, escalated so much that large parts of the city were destroyed. The Indonesian police have not proved to be able to provide reassurance, but participated in part depending on religious self- alignment of the policemen in the unrest. Especially the Indonesian military played a fatal role and let in disregard of government commands happen thousands of fighters of the Islamist Laskar Jihad freely on their way from Java to the Moluccas. This contributed significantly to the escalation of fighting that cost on the entire Moluccas estimated 10,000 lives, most of them Christians. Again and again in the period that followed riots and assaults, and in 2004 also to several bombings. Since 2005, the situation has again relatively calm.