Tribal fighting in PNG's highlands has escalated into guerilla warfare, leaving desperate villagers with nowhere to go
Villages in PNG's Enga region have been burned to the ground in spiralling tribal violence. (ABC News: Tim Swanston)
From a vantage point atop a ridge, Papua New Guinea police and soldiers look down at the pillars of smoke rising from a nearby village.
The pops of gunshots reverberate around the normally lush hillside, now tinged black from fires that have razed homes to the ground.
Rural police commander Richard Koki watches on.
"Our manpower's stretched to the limit," he says.
"We've become spectators, we're just waiting for the tribes to calm down."
Police have swarmed Enga Province in a desperate bid to bring a long-running tribal conflict under control. They've turned a boarding school near Wapenamanda into their base, with the students sent to the capital, Wabag, for safety.
Commander Koki draws a square in the dirt, with two circles inside.
He's explaining how two tribes begin to fight. As he adds circles outside the square, he describes how more tribes join in the fighting, escalating the violence.
"In tribal fights, there's no winners. There's always losers."
This conflict began with an ambush at a funeral.
A man was found dead in the Lai River, which runs down the mountain through Wabag and the surrounding villages. His tribe blamed the man's parents-in-law, from another village.
At his funeral in May, attackers killed five people with bush knives and axes.
In the months following, tit-for-tat retribution has spiralled out of control, and as more tribes have become involved, many villages have been raided and burnt down.
While tribal fighting in the province has been rife since the national election last year, this latest bout has disturbed the nation.
In one attack, police say a man and his young daughter were killed as "collateral" when their truck was ambushed, with the intended target sitting in the back.
In another, five hired gunmen were killed in an unsuccessful raid.
A widely shared video that made local and international headlines showed the bodies of three of those men, tied to the back of a ute, being dragged down the road, in an apparent message to warn against involving mercenaries in the fight.
Police don't know the exact figure but say at least 60 to 70 people have died in recent months, including more than 20 mercenaries.
The retrieval of bodies, often amputated or sometimes beheaded, is taking its toll on officers, while locals whose villages have been destroyed are left with nowhere to go.
'They burnt down our houses … we came with nothing'
This conflict stretches along a large section of the province's major highway, from Wapenamanda to an area near the capital, with homes, stores, marketplaces and even schools burnt to the ground.
The charred and melted remains of these homes haven't been cleared amid the violent fighting that continues to rage.
Wabag's Deputy Mayor Lenny Maliso believes many thousands have been forced from their villages.
"Town itself is safe, but people are scattered all over the place," she says.
"People are displaced and we accommodate them because of our Melanesian culture."
Martin Mark, from one of the original tribes involved in the fighting, is sitting by the highway near the remnants of what used to be the village shop.
"When the fight came, we lost everything," he says.
"Our market area, homes, semi-permanent houses, cars were all destroyed."
Many people have sought refuge in the village of Birip.
One of them is Lucy Sendol, a local primary school teacher who had to flee when her village was being attacked.
"They burnt down our houses, we didn't take anything except our keys and fled with our children," she says.
"We took nothing, no blankets, no mattresses, no eating utensils, nothing at all.
"We cannot find food to eat, we don't have money … we came with nothing."
Ms Sendol's school was burnt down, leaving her students with nowhere to learn.
A community leader in Birip says there are thousands more now living in his village, to the point it is overpopulated, with some families accommodating women and children from both sides of the fight.
Outgunned, and against an 'armory of bullets'
Much of Enga is in a lockdown and under a curfew, with no flights in or out.
To get to the area, you have to fly to Mt Hagen in the Western Highlands and drive a couple of hours along the major highway.
At a border checkpoint, police and defence are searching vehicles for guns and ammunition, or anything else that might fuel the tribal fighting.
The day that ABC News flew to Mt Hagen, a man was arrested at Port Moresby's Jackson airport, for trying to fly to the Western Highlands with 300 rounds of ammunition.
"We have to be very cautious in dealing with our ammunition, it's scarce at our level," Commander Koki says, listening to the regular gunfire coming from a nearby fight.
"When you hear gunshots at the battlefield, it implies they've still got an armory of bullets."
Commander Koki says some leaders of the tribal community are the ones financing the seemingly endless supply of high-powered weaponry and ammunition.
It's this access to guns that has vastly changed the nature of tribal fighting — what's happening now has been described as guerilla warfare.
Compared to bush knives, axes and other traditional weapons, firearms are far more effective as a deadly weapon.
This leads to more people being killed before peace can be negotiated, undermining the chances of resolving long-running tensions.
PNG's national police, the Royal Papua New Guinea Police Constabulary, are working to send reinforcements to the region, including a newly formed tactical squad, while also focusing their efforts on arresting and prosecuting people who are arming those on the ground.
Police Commissioner David Manning says officers are carrying out search warrants for the communications devices of "known agitators", including businessmen and political leaders.
Wabag's deputy mayor says businessmen who are involved should have their bank accounts frozen.
The road to peace
While police focus their efforts on the key instigators, the local community is pleading for peace.
PNG's population is almost entirely Christian and church groups are deeply important to many people in the country.
Hundreds of men, women and children, all Seventh Day Adventists, have converged on Wabag to spread a message of peace through some of the villages that have been fighting in the last few weeks.
Sporting yellow polo shirts, they march down the highway brandishing signs and posters, with one reading: "Don't fight, Jesus is coming."
"Somebody has to step in and do something," Pastor David Maxwell says.
"[We want] to tell them we love you, we're concerned … a lot of lives have been lost."
Suddenly, the rally shudders to a halt. Security personnel have heard gunshots further up the highway.
Defence go on ahead to check if the road is safe, and after a few minutes, things get back underway.
Looking out over smouldering homes, Commander Koki is hopeful that the fighting can be resolved.
He says once reinforcements arrive, police and defence will be able to work more safely with neutral tribal leaders and coordinate peace talks.
"Until we have complete peace in every tribe and every district, that's when we can talk about disarmament," he says.
"The government can go out and do an amnesty and buy back the guns from the people."
But for the locals, there is a long way to go.
Back in Wabag, Cr Maliso is deeply saddened by the damage this conflict has already wrought on so many — particularly the children of the Enga region.
"Young students are dying," she says.
"Children's futures are being affected. Their mothers raised them up to an age where they think they will go to school, get an education to look after their family.
"That's not happening."