The Sydney Morning Herald, October 17 2002
Jakarta has played with fire of Islamic extremism
By Hamish McDonald
October 17 2002
Although the Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, has dismissed the line of suspicion
as "silly", some officials in his entourage must have wondered as they did the rounds
of Indonesian military and police chiefs in Jakarta yesterday how clean were some of
the hands they were shaking.
There is a long history of political manipulators within the Indonesian armed forces, or
TNI, playing with the fire of Islamic extremism and staging incidents of terrorism.
There is also the institution itself carrying out state terror as in Aceh, Ambon and
East Timor - either directly or through militia proxies.
David Jenkins, a journalist, recalled the Machiavellian use of former Darul Islam
fanatics by the intelligence chief Ali Murtopo during ex-president Soeharto's New
Order, leading to acts of terror, such as the 1980 hijacking of a Garuda Airlines jet,
that were used to justify political crackdowns.
The bombings that hit Jakarta in the second half of 2000 included a car-bomb
explosion outside the home of the Philippines ambassador, which killed two people,
and a huge car-bomb blast in the underground car park of the Jakarta Stock
Exchange, which killed 15 people and for which two members of the army special
forces or Kopassus received jail terms.
The explosive used in at least one of these bombings was C-4, the charge used in the
Sari nightclub bombing. It is widely used by armies and terror groups, such as in the
al-Qaeda boat attack on the destroyer USS Cole.
If the Bali explosive is traced by some chemical signature to stocks held by the TNI,
the possibility still remains it could have been obtained by al-Qaeda or the South-East
Asian network of Jemaah Islamiah from sympathisers or corrupt elements within the
military. Once obtained, getting a large amount of C-4 into a parked car in Kuta would
not have required any special logistical or security assistance.
President, Megawati Soekarnoputri's 14 months in office have seen several blows at
entrenched New Order or "status-quo" forces.
The heaviest was the four-year jail term recently given to the parliamentary speaker
and Golkar party chief, Akbar Tanjung, who remains in his posts while his case is
under appeal. Another has been the constitutional changes which will end the TNI's
special representation in the legislature in a couple of years.
Jakarta's failure of accountability for the atrocities in Timor remains a huge obstacle to
resumed military ties with the Americans. The TNI's image is also tarnished by the
evident backing of its Strategic Reserve Command and other elements for the Laskar
Jihad, a force of several thousand young Islamic fanatics set against the Christian
communities in the Moluccan islands and in the coastal towns of Papua.
What is emerging as the deliberate staging by Kopassus soldiers of a freedom fighter
"ambush" last month near the Freeport mine at Timika, Papua, seems to have been
the first deliberate targeting of foreigners. Three schoolteachers, two American and
one Indonesian, were murdered.
The upsurge in Laskar Jihad activity and the Timika murders follow the posting as
Papuan regional military commander of Major-General Mahidin Simbolon, who was a
key figure in orchestrating the East Timor violence in 1999.
The promptness with which the Laskar Jihad announced on Tuesday it was
disbanding and withdrawing from Ambon only serves to illustrate the degree to which
it was inspired from above.
The Bali bombing may well have been solely the work of Islamic extremists, rather
than an effort by the "status-quo" forces to undermine Megawati or bring US support
back to the TNI.
If foreign support is directed not just to the hunt for terrorists, but behind a decisive
cleaning-up of the TNI, Indonesia and our region will be made more secure.
Copyright © 2002. The Sydney Morning Herald.
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