Shoot them?
How very helpful...
A conflict zone should contain two factions and you should be able to choose to which faction you want to belong. After that you can fight for that faction. At the moment not a single conflict zone I have visited yesterday or today has more than one faction present and therefore it's not possible to engage in a fight.
Also this makes the 'Warzone' missions currently impossible to complete.
I'm not sure if this is always the case, but I've found a 1 faction civil war and because I'm friendly with the local faction the radar does highlight that there are 2 factions present. It's just that the non-local faction ships are factionless. Killing them lets me fulfil the mission and not upset the local faction that put me on it.
They could do with adding something to the code that creates a "rebel faction" in this situation I guess.
Also this makes the 'Warzone' missions currently impossible to complete.
PS: more about this issue here
Not true. I chose the only faction available then attacked anything that wasn't that faction and managed to complete the mission. What doesn't happen is combat bounty.