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Christians allege forced circumcisions
South China Morning Post Wednesday, January 31, 2001-Hundreds of Christian refugees have been evacuated from a remote island in Indonesia's troubled Maluku province amid reports on Wednesday that armed Muslim militias are forcing villagers to convert to Islam.
Church workers said many of the refugees were circumcised.
"Both women and men were circumcised with razor blades in conversion ceremonies," said Cornelius Bohm, the secretary of a Christian crisis centre in the provincial capital, Ambon.
Some people reported that after the operation their genitals were washed in urine in a primitive attempt at sterilisation, Mr Bohm said.
Maluku Governor Saleh Latuconsina denied there had been any forced conversions to Islam on the islands of Kesui and Teor, 400km east of Ambon. But he acknowledged that some Christian villagers had switched religions to protect themselves from Muslim gangs.
The reports are a disturbing escalation in a two-year-old conflict between the members of the two religions in the archipelagic province, 2,600km east of Jakarta.
At least 5,000 people from both faiths have been killed in sectarian violence despite a heavy military presence and repeated peace efforts by Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid, himself a Muslim scholar who has long preached religious tolerance.
A government team supervised Tuesday's evacuation of 648 people from the islands. A Navy transport, the KRI Teluk Mandar, took them to nearby Tual island, where they are said to be in good health though lacking clothes and medicine.
Mr Bohm blamed the forced conversions on a local branch of the Laskar Jihad, or Holy War Troops, a Muslim paramilitary group from Indonesia's main island of Java.
Since the group's arrival in the province last year the conflict has intensified. Local government officials have accused it of being behind some of the most bloody incidents.
The militia has denied any involvement in the conversions.
"It is completely untrue and is being blown up by the Christians to get attention from the United Nations," Jafar Umar Thalib, commander of the 3,000-strong-group, said on Wednesday.
In the past, Mr Thalib and other Laskar Jihad leaders have vowed to rid the islands of Christians. They also have expressed support for the country's former dictator Suharto.
Foreign diplomats have accused hardline army generals loyal to Suharto of funding and training the paramilitaries in an apparent effort to undermine the government of President Abdurrahman Wahid.
Indonesia is the world's most populous Islamic nation. About 85 percent of its 205 million people are Muslim.
However, in Maluku - which has a population of about two million people - the balance between Christians and Muslims is almost even.
Also on Wednesday, a Muslim mob hacked a Christian to death at Ambon's seaport, police said. No other details were available.
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