Police guard tense Bali prison after riots

Jakarta, Indonesia (CNN) -- Indonesian security forces maintained a heavy presence Thursday at a prison in Bali as authorities prepared to move inmates from the heavily damaged facility following a riot.

"While we repair the damage, foreign and female inmates will be evacuated first," according to military spokesman Lt. Col. Wing Handoko, who said there are about 120 women at the prison. "We are ... trying to move them for their own safety and convenience."

The inmates will be moved to a temporary detention center he said.

Hundreds of Indonesian police officers had charged into Kerobokan Prison on Wednesday morning to subdue inmates who had been rioting since the previous evening.

The measure appeared to initially bring the situation under control at the prison a few kilometers from Denpasar Airport and the popular tourist area of Kuta.

But trouble erupted again Wednesday evening, when prisoners threw Molotov cocktails and stones at the officers on duty. That disturbance lasted about 30 minutes, said Inspector General Saud Usman Nasution, a spokesman for the Indonesian National Police.

The police say they believe the rioting is the consequence of a stabbing that took place in the prison on Sunday. The inmates are also apparently demanding better conditions at the overcrowded prison.

"They demanded that two of their fellow inmate friends, who were hurt and hospitalized, be brought back inside," said Nasution, referring to the prisoners who rioted Wednesday night.

"Secondly, they want the stabbing incident on February 19 to be investigated thoroughly," he said. "They also want several internal policies in the prison to be addressed."

The unrest has taken place in a separate block from the one housing foreign inmates. None of the 60 foreign prisoners in Kerobokan were harmed, the police said.

The prison is where Schapelle Corby, an Australian beauty therapist convicted in 2005 of smuggling nine pounds of marijuana into Bali, is serving a 20 year sentence.

The 12 Australians in the prison are unharmed, the Australian authorities have said.

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