Officers are believed to be angry over unpaid allowances from the Apec conference over the weekend

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Papua New Guinea’s national parliament was in lockdown on Tuesday after hundreds of soldiers and police officers attacked the building, smashing vehicles and entryways.

The officers are believed to have attacked the parliament in protest against unpaid allowances from the Apec conference at the weekend, before blocking surrounding streets.

The parliamentarian Allan Bird told Guardian Australia that he and other opposition MPs had been in a locked conference room when they heard the group.

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“We heard them coming in, you could hear them smashing things – the glass entryways, a few vehicles on the way in,” he said.

“I understand some of the parliament security guards were assaulted, a few ministers may have also been assaulted. I think the [group] were mostly targeting ministers, but anyone who got in their way was roughed up.”

A police spokesman told Guardian Australia he didn’t have any further information beyond the fact that some “disgruntled” police officers and soldiers had attacked the building.

Bird said he didn’t feel in danger as the opposition were not the target of the “unhappy” soldiers and officers. “I know we haven’t done anything wrong as an opposition … but I’d be scared if I was a member of government, to be honest,” he said.

“I think it’s a lot of longstanding issues, but the trigger was the nonpayment of allowances from Apec. That was the spark that set them off.”

The crowd of an estimated 300 people later dispersed, after meeting with ministers and reportedly receiving assurances they would be paid on Wednesday.

Chris Hawkins, the chief executive of Apec and a senior adviser to the prime minister, said payments had already started. “The payment of allowances for police, CS and defence normally take a week to process at the end of the end of a major event,” he told the ABC.

“The meeting ended two days ago and the security operation is now winding down.

But by Tuesday evening there were widespread reports of looting in different areas of Port Moresby.

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The opposition MP Bryan Kramer said police had been on site shortly after the attack. “Members of the armed forces including CIS [Corrective Institutions Service] and police stormed parliament over grievances over their allowances,” he said on social media.

Kramer said he and colleagues had been told that the police commissioner, Gary Baki, the police minister and members of police had met on Tuesday morning to discuss the allowances issue. After the meeting members of the police force travelled to parliament and stormed the building, he said. “Numerous staff of parliament were assaulted as part of this confrontation.”

He said the group was outside the parliament waiting to be addressed by the government.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Papua New Guinea parliament building in central Port Moresby. Photograph: David Gray/Reuters

Media were escorted into the building on Tuesday afternoon to wait for the prime minister, Peter O’Neill, Baki, and the Apec minister, Justin Tkatchenko, who were holding an emergency meeting.

The Police Association appeared to support the rogue officers and said it was a “slap in the face” that officers had not been paid for helping the government host thousands of dignitaries and delegates. “It is an absolute disgrace that these efforts are not adequately recognised.”

It called for immediate payment, warning that delays would escalate the situation. Funds had been budgeted within Apec costs and there was no excuse for nonpayment, it said.

Apec wrapped up at the weekend without a joint communique from attending leaders – for the first time in the conference’s history – and after extraordinary confrontations between Chinese and PNG officials.

In the lead-up, PNG citizens staged two nationwide strikes in protest at the government’s spending on the conference, including exorbitant infrastructure projects and the purchase of a fleet of Maseratis and several Bentleys. Tkatchenko claimed the luxury cars were to be used driving dignitaries around, and that all would then be purchased by the “private sector”, resulting in no cost to the government.

The government has also been widely criticised by its people for cutting the salaries of teachers and other public servants, and presiding over a health crisis and medication shortage. It has also struggled to pay electricity bills for government departments in the past.