A tribe, their allies and mercenaries were on their way to attack a neighbouring tribe when they were ambushed on Sunday in Enga province in the South Pacific nation’s remote highlands, Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary Acting Superintendent George Kakas told the ABC.

Police expected to find more dead bodies among the wounded who had escaped into the woods, he said.

“These tribesmen have been killed all over the countryside, all over the bush,” Kakas said.

Bodies were collected from the battlefield, roads and riverside, then loaded onto police trucks and taken to the hospital.

Kakas said authorities were still counting “those who were shot, injured and ran off into the bushes”.

“We presume the numbers will go up to 60 or 65,” he said.

Kakas said it could be the highest death toll from such violence in the highlands, where there were few roads and most of the inhabitants were subsistence farmers.

Police in the capital of Port Moresby did not immediately respond to the AP’s request for confirmation of the massacre.

Papua New Guinea is a diverse, developing nation of 10 million people with 800 languages in a strategically important part of the South Pacific.

Internal security has become an increasing challenge for its government as China, the United States and Australia seek closer security ties.

Tribal violence in the Enga region has intensified since elections in 2022 that maintained Prime Minister James Marape’s administration.

Enga Governor Peter Ipatas said there were warnings that tribal fighting was about to erupt.

“From a provincial perspective, we knew this fight was going to be on and we (alerted) the security forces last week to make sure they took appropriate action to ensure this didn’t occur,” Ipatas told the ABC.

Ipatas described the violence as a “very, very sad occasion for us in the province and it’s a bad thing for the country”.

– AAP