Red shirts occupy provincial halls

Kanyapak Maneechan, a leader of the hard-line Love Chiang Mai 51 group, and 500 red shirts arrived by motorcycle and car at almost 4pm. They tore down the metal and concrete barriers in front of the hall's gates by jerking them back and forth while 50 police stood by without trying to stop them.

After gaining entry to the compound, the red shirts gathered in front of the main hall and blasted the government for using force against their comrades in Bangkok.

The killings of 1965-66

Even now, Indonesians find it difficult to face the traumatic events of the past

Robert Cribb and Michele Ford

Prisoners captured during the Trisula Operation

Photograph taken at the Museum Brawijaya by Vannessa Hearman

In the course of little more than five months from late 1965 to early 1966, anti-communist Indonesians killed about half a million of their fellow citizens. Nearly all the victims were associated with Indonesia's Left, especially with the Communist Party (PKI) that had risen to unprecedented national prominence under President Sukarno's Guided Democracy. The massacres were presided over and often coordinated or carried out by anti-communist sections of the Indonesian army, but they also engaged wider elements of Indonesian society - both people who had reason to fear communist power and people who wanted to establish clear anti-communist credentials in troubled times.