Ambon

Ambon or Amboina, island in eastern Indonesia, one of the Moluccas Islands, in the Banda Sea. The island is mountainous but has a fertile and well-watered coastal plain. The chief products are cloves, nutmeg, rice, sugar, and copra, which are shipped from the port city of Ambon. Its area is about 813 sq km (314 sq mi).

The Portuguese were the first Europeans to reach the island of Ambon. They established a number of fortresses there and began trading for spices in 1512. Throughout the 16th century the island thrived as a trading post for nutmeg, cloves, and other spices and became an important religious centre with a substantial Christian population. Ambon was visited by Dutch and English traders, as expeditions by the Dutch and English East India companies sought opportunities to develop further trading outposts. However, in 1605 the island was captured by the Dutch East Inda Company (VOC), who claimed the territory from the Portuguese. An English settlement on the island was destroyed by the Dutch in the Ambon Massacre of 1623, in which several people were executed on suspicion of conspiring to overthrow the Dutch administration. Except for a few brief periods when Ambon was captured by the British (from 1796 to 1802 and from 1810 to 1814) and occupied by the Japanese (1942 to 1945), the island was held by the Dutch until 1949, when Indonesia gained its independence from the Netherlands. Ambon led a brief revolt against Indonesia in 1950. After the end of Dutch rule, many Ambonese emigrated to the Netherlands to escape the violence between rebels and government troops. In the 1990s large-scale Muslim immigration to the island from other parts of the archipelago reduced the Christian majority among the island's population and violent clashes broke out between the two religious groups in 1999. The unrest escalated and hundreds of people were killed in the fighting, with thousands more emigrating. A peace deal was signed in February 2002, although tensions remain on the island.