A police spokesman said security forces had gone to full alert as rioting by extremist Muslims entered a second day, emptying the resort area of tourists. He said one person had died so far after being hit by a rubber bullet and 52 people have been arrested.

    The fighting erupted on Monday at a rally of tens of thousands of Muslims in Lombok, protesting the government's inability to stem violence in the Malukus region between Christians and Muslims that has claimed over 2,000 lives in the past year. Some Muslim leaders in Indonesia have called for a holy war against Christians and the Lombok fighting appeared directed at them as most of the churches on the island were destroyed.

    Indonesia is the most populous Muslim majority nation in the world, although the Maluku region, formerly the Dutch colony known as the Spice Islands, has a sizeable Christian minority. The country's worst economic crisis in decades as well as political turmoil have escalated tensions between the groups, spilling into outright violence between religious gangs. Many Christians are ethnic Chinese and are perceived as being wealthier than the general populace, much as Jews were portrayed in 1930s Nazi Germany.

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