CNSNews, May 03, 2002
Int'l Christian Groups Want Indonesian Jihad Fighters Expelled
By Patrick Goodenough, Pacific Rim Bureau Chief
Pacific Rim Bureau (CNSNews.com) - International Christian organizations are urging
the Indonesian government to expel an Islamic "jihad" group from the country's
strife-torn Maluku province and arrest its leader, following killings widely blamed on
the militants.
Church leaders in the province have sent an "SOS call" to U.N. secretary-general Kofi
Annan, urging urgent intervention on the grounds the Indonesian authorities were
unwilling or unable to help safeguard Christians.
Copies of the letter, which was signed by Catholic and Protestant leaders, were sent
to President Bush and other heads of state, as well as the Pope and other Christian
leaders.
The appeals come after a pre-dawn attack on a Christian village last Sunday that left
14 people dead. Eyewitnesses said the masked gunmen shouted "Allahu Akbar"
(Allah is greater) and spoke in a Javanese accent, strengthening the widely-held
suspicion that they were members of Laskar Jihad, a Muslim militia from Indonesia's
main island of Java.
Even the governor of Maluku went on the record as linking Laskar Jihad to the attack.
Around 38 hours before the attack, Laskar Jihad leader Jafar Umar Thalib delivered a
fiery speech to followers at a mosque in the provincial capital, Ambon, urging them to
ignore a peace agreement reached in February. That agreement stemmed from an
effort to end more than three years of bloodshed between Christians and Muslims.
Governor Saleh Latuconsina said the attack "had to do with the provocation by the
chairman of an extreme group who addressed a mass gathering held before the
incident."
Despite this, however, the governor said he would not order police to arrest Jafar -
even though standing orders to that effect had gone out long ago - because it could
lead to violence by his supporters.
"We need to think carefully of the consequences, especially for the local people,"
Latuconsina said, adding that he had no plan to arrest Jafar in the near future because
of the impact it could have.
National police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar was quoted Thursday as concurring, saying:
"We do not want to arrest anyone [in connection with the killings], because they may
follow that up with even more violence."
Laskar Jihad could not provide a spokesman to respond to the allegations when
contacted Friday. But a representative of the group, Ayip Syarifuddin, told local media
it rejected the claim of a link between Jafar's speech and the raid.
For the attack to have been a direct result of masses fired up by the speech, he said,
it would have to have taken place "immediately after the provocation" occurred.
Christians demand action
Critics have long accused the Indonesian government of being reluctant to challenge
Laskar Jihad and other militant groups for fear of angering Muslims elsewhere in the
vast country.
Jafar himself is suspected of links with some leading Indonesian politicians.
Local Christian representatives, such as Fr. Cornelius Bohm of the Ambon Crisis
Center, said Jafar must be arrested, a call joined by international religious freedom
campaigners.
International Christian Concern (ICC), a Washington-DC based human rights group,
called for the immediate arrest of Jafar and other militia members provoking or
carrying out violent acts.
ICC urged Christians to contact the Indonesian Embassy and the State Department to
protest the situation in Maluku.
In London, Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) also called for Jafar's arrest and the
expulsion of Laskar Jihad members, and said those responsible for Sunday's attack
must be brought to justice.
CSW cited the February peace agreement, which while not requiring Laskar Jihad
volunteers to leave Maluku, did say that "outsiders who create disorder" would be
expelled.
The agreement was signed by the government and local Christian and Muslim
representatives, but rejected by Laskar Jihad.
CSW director Rev. Stuart Windsor called on Jakarta to "protect all its citizens from
violence and to put adequate security measures in place."
'Pretext'
Muslims in Ambon blamed a rise in tensions last week on a ceremony Thursday by
RMS, a small separatist group that was marking the 52nd anniversary of a short-lived
breakaway republic in the South Maluku area.
The ceremony was held despite government warnings, curfews and the arrest of RMS
leader Alex Manuputty and some of his supporters.
RMS is seen as predominantly Christian, although Bohm and others say most local
Christians have little time for it.
In his speech last week, Jafar called for an all-out war against RMS Christians.
But Christian groups involved in Indonesia say the real target is all Christians, and the
RMS issue is merely being used as a pretext.
"Islamist militants have tried to exaggerate the RMS's support ... to justify their
presence in the region as 'defenders of the national sovereignty of Indonesia'," CSW
said, noting that RMS is believed to have 200 supporters at the most.
Ian Freestone of the Australia-based Indonesia for Christ said the attacks were being
launched on the pretext of "dealing with Christian separatists," but most Maluku
Christians are not aligned with RMS.
"In using this lame excuse Laskar Jihad are receiving state sponsored support for
their renewed acts of terror," he said.
The ICC in Washington observed that in contrast to Jafar's warlike rhetoric, RMS
leader Manuputty had urged his supporters not to break the law.
"It is the height of hypocrisy that the RMS leader should be arrested on charges of
separatist activity while the head of the Laskar Jihad, who has called for violent
attacks against Christians, is allowed to go free."
Not only Christians see the local authorities' action as one-sided. Hasyim Muzadi, the
head of Indonesia's largest Muslim organization, Nadhlatul Ulama (NU), said after a
meeting with President Megawati Sukarnoputri in Jakarta Wednesday that he had told
her "tough measures must be taken against Laskar Jihad and [RMS] ... there should
be no discrimination."
Megawati has ordered the Maluku authorities to strictly enforce the law.
Next target?
In recent months, Laskar Jihad fighters have started arriving in another restive
Indonesian province, Papua in the far east of the country.
A local human rights group, Elsham, said last month as many as 3,000 jihad warriors
were now in Papua, a majority Christian area formerly known as Irian Jaya.
A familiar pattern has emerged. A pro-independence movement has been growing in
Papua since the fall of the autocratic former President Gen. Suharto in 1998. A wire
agency quoted a Laskar Jihad member as saying they had arrived to fight "Papuan
separatists."
Papua church leader Pastor Martin Luther Wanma told Australian radio last month
that the outsiders were publishing a newspaper urging local Muslims to rise up
against their Christian neighbors. Until now they had lived in harmony for decades, he
said.
According to the UK-based Christian aid group, Barnabas Fund, the Muslim
volunteers in Papua are also distributing videotapes showing footage of the "holy war
against Christians" in Maluku.
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