Indonesian villagers kill nearly 300 crocodiles in revenge attack

REUTERS - Indonesian villagers armed with knives, hammers, and clubs slaughtered 292 crocodiles in revenge for the death of a man killed by a crocodile at a breeding farm, an official said on Saturday (July 14). Video showed bloodied carcasses of the crocodiles in a large pile in the Sorong district of the eastern Indonesian province of West Papua. The head of Indonesia's Natural Resources Conservation Agency in West Papua said that the 48-year-old victim had entered the crocodile farm and was likely picking grass for animal feed when he was attacked. After the burial of the man on Saturday, villagers entered the farm and killed all the crocodiles, authorities said. Authorities said the farm had been given a license to breed protected saltwater and New Guinea crocodiles in 2013 for preservation and also to harvest some of the animals. But one of the conditions was that the reptiles did not disturb the community, they said.