San Francisco Chronicle, Friday, December 14, 2001
Religious war brews in Indonesia's Sulawesi district
Christians take to hills after Muslim attacks
Ian Timberlake, Chronicle Foreign Service
Poso, Indonesia -- The requests come in hushed tones or with a nervous smile:
Send us some guns. "Then I'll shoot some jihad," said a Christian fighter who gave his
name as Anton, 24. "America hasn't helped us yet." Thousands of Christian villagers
in this Central Sulawesi district have fled to the hills to escape a recent offensive by
Muslim holy warriors. Religious, ethnic and separatist violence across Indonesia has
killed thousands of people over the past three years. But the latest eruption in the
Sulawesi district, about 1,000 miles northeast of Jakarta, has focused renewed
attention on a Muslim militia called Laskar Jihad, whose leader, Ja'far Umar Thalib,
says he has fought for two years against the former Soviet Union in Afghanistan.
Laskar Jihad moved into Sulawesi a few months ago after engaging in sectarian
fighting in the Maluku Islands. In Poso, the Muslim holy warriors seized five villages
during a three-day offensive that began on Nov. 27 and killed at least five Christians.
"They came to the corner of the village and threw a bomb," said the commander of the
Christian forces in Padalembara village. "Our houses and churches were destroyed."
Unable to resist the advance, the commander and more than 100 other men, women
and children trekked for two days and nights through heavily forested mountains to the
safety of a Christian area on the edge of Lore Lindu National Park. More than 8,000
refugees are now staying in the park area.
ROOTS OF THE DISPUTE
The confrontation has its roots in a dispute in 1998 between Muslims and Christians
over control of the local Poso government. The fighting has left hundreds dead and
forced an estimated 75,000 people from their homes. In the single worst incident of
the conflict, Christian forces executed dozens of Muslims who had surrendered in
May 2000. Almost 90 percent of Indonesia's population of 210 million people are
Muslim, but in the Poso district, Christians hold a slight majority. They were the
original inhabitants of the area but were later joined by Muslims who immigrated or
were resettled from other parts of the archipelago. Laskar Jihad, based on Indonesia's
main island of Java, is fighting for a unified Indonesia in which Muslims can live under
Islamic law but denies reports that it is armed with military-style weapons. It says it
sent about 1, 000 of its troops to Poso not to attack Christians but to defend
Muslims, engage in social work and conduct religious education. "We came here
because they attacked our brothers in Poso," Abu Umar, 27, chairman of Laskar
Jihad's Central Sulawesi district, said in an interview. The group hopes to double its
forces in Poso "as fast as we can," he said. The militia first came to public attention
early in 2000 when it set up a training camp near Jakarta and quickly sent fighters to
defend Muslims in Maluku and North Maluku provinces, where their presence led to
an escalation of the Muslim-Christian conflict there. Before leaving his post in
mid-October, former U.S. Ambassador to Indonesia Robert Gelbard expressed
concern about Laskar Jihad, saying: "We're not dealing with a group here which is
armed with heavy weapons, but still I consider them dangerous."
LINKS TO AL QAEDA ALLEGED
Sulawesi is fertile ground for Laskar Jihad. The beauty and the tragedy of this region
become clear on the road from Palu to Poso. Beneath a dark ridge of mountains,
palm trees tower over the remains of houses burned during earlier phases of the
conflict. Entire villages have been destroyed. Paramilitary police keep watch from
roadside posts, but there are still many Jihad observation posts, some of them
unattended during the day. The wooden shacks usually fly a black flag with Arabic
writing. A few of the posts are decorated with posters of Osama bin Laden -- not an
uncommon sight in Indonesia, where some people admire him for standing up to the
United States. On Wednesday, Indonesia's intelligence chief, Lt. Gen. Abdullah
Hendropriyono, charged that Laskar Jihad was linked to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda
network. He said the fighting on Sulawesi is "the result of cooperation between
international terrorists and domestic radical groups." But Umar denies that there are
ties between Laskar Jihad and bin Laden. "They say there's an Osama bin Laden
network here. There isn't," he said. "We have different principles from Osama bin
Laden, and we are not sympathetic to his struggle."
EXPERIENCE IN AFGHANISTAN
Umar said about 20 Laskar Jihad warriors in Poso have experience fighting the
Soviets in Afghanistan or have trained in the Philippines. He denied unconfirmed
reports that Afghans are serving alongside Indonesian Muslims in Poso. "There are no
Afghans who have deliberately come here to wage war," said Umar, a former
computer software marketer who wore a long robe and a black-and- white head
covering during the interview. If Laskar Jihad is trying to defend Muslims, it hasn't
convinced people like Kiman, who lives with about 50 other Muslims in the mountain
valley where thousands of Christians have sought refuge from the latest fighting. With
so many Christians in the area now, Kiman, who uses only one name, worries that
the Jihad forces might try to attack -- and not take the time to check his religion.
"Sometimes I can't sleep at night," said Kiman, a farmer who became a refugee when
fighting drove him from his home near Tentena last year.
NEW POLICE CRACKDOWN
The government has announced a six-month effort to restore security and rebuild the
district. To carry it out, hundreds of paramilitary police reinforcements were flown to
Poso this month. It will not be easy, and the graffiti on a burned building just outside
Poso provide an ominous warning of what could lie ahead. It says: "The war hasn't
ended."
©2001 San Francisco Chronicle
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