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The Church of England Newspaper


The Church of England Newspaper, Wednesday, 2nd November, 2005

Three Indonesian Christian girls beheaded in barbaric attack

Number: 5793 Date: Nov 2

By Nick Weinberg

THE BEHEADING of three Christian students in Poso, last Saturday, has again highlighted the simmering sectarian tensions in Indonesia. The three girls, aged 16 to 19, were attacked by unidentified assailants whilst walking to their Christian school in the tense province of Central Sulawesi. One of the heads was left in front of a new Christian church and the others near a police station. The attacks brought condemnation from the Pope who labelled the murders "barbaric". Joaquin Navarro-Valls, the Vatican spokesman, added that Pope Benedict XVI had charged the bishop of Manado "to offer his heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and the diocesan community."

Police have questioned several people about the killings, which left another girl injured. The girl who survived the weekend’s attack is reported to be in a stable condition and has been moved from Poso to a police hospital in the provincial capital of Pa! lu. More than 1,000 police have been deployed to secure the rugged Central Sulawesi region in a bid to prevent revenge attacks. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who has ordered police to track down the killers, described the attacks as "sadistic and inhumane." The murders have exacerbated simmering tensions in the province in the run-up to the Eid al-Fitr festival, which marks the end of the holy fasting month of Ramadan.

Most of the violence in the large but sparsely populated Poso area occurs around the predominantly Muslim seaside town of Poso and the hilltop Christian town of Tentena. Muslim-Christian clashes in the Poso regency killed around 2,000 people from 1998 to 2001, when a truce was agreed. There have been sporadic outbreaks since the truce, including the market bombings last May in Tetena that killed 22 people. About 85 per cent of Indonesia’s 220 million population are Muslim. But in some eastern parts, Christian and Muslim populations are almost equal.
 


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