*EPF204 05/07/2002
Commission Says Christians in Moluccas Faced Conversion or Death
(Says Muslim extremist group Laskar Jihad inflames violence) (960)

By Steve La Rocque
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington -- Indonesia is going through turbulent times, with religious freedom and security for minorities under pressure from Muslim extremists, according to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

In a new report released May 6 in Washington, D.C., the USCIRF said Indonesia was a "particularly unstable country at the present time," still beset by economic hardships and challenges resulting from corruption and state control of the economy for decades as well as the Asian financial crisis.

While a democratic government has emerged in Indonesia after decades of one-man rule, the report said, there has been a "burgeoning of groups whose religious ambitions have become politicized -- and in some cases radicalized."

The report cites conflict between Muslims and Christians in Indonesia's Moluccan island group starting in May 1999 that has resulted in the death of "approximately 9,000 people."

The report goes on to say how the Muslim extremist group Laskar Jihad moved into the islands and "raised the fighting to more deadly levels."

While "government neglect" allowed Laskar Jihad to heighten the level of violence there, the report says, the Jakarta regime was more active in stopping similar violence in Sulawesi.

The report notes that in both the Moluccas and Sulawesi "hundreds of houses of worship were deliberately destroyed. And in both cases, the sectarian violence was exacerbated by the presence of Laskar Jihad fighters."

After the arrival of Laskar Jihad fighters to the Moluccas, "there were reports of thousands of people being forced to convert to Islam or face death," the report says, with many men and women being "forcibly circumcised," according to the USCIRF.

Laskar Jihad has vowed to disrupt any attempts at reconciliation, the USCIRF says.

The report cites the U.S. State Department as saying that both active duty and retired Indonesian military personnel either stood by or participated in "the torture or execution of Christians who refused to convert to Islam on the islands of Ambon, Kesui, Buru, and Seram."

The report also faults the Jakarta regime for "insufficient effort" to prevent Laskar Jihad fighters from going to the Moluccas, and "no effort to remove them from the islands, even though members continue to be responsible for prolonging the violence there.

The report says a meeting between Indonesia's new vice president Hamzah Haz and the leader of Laskar Jihad in August 2001 "gave the group a new legitimacy."

An agreement reached in February of this year for a peace accord in the troubled Moluccas has not ended violence, the report says, with both Christians and Muslim supporters of the accord subject to "sporadic violence."

The state of emergency there continues, the report says, with Jakarta saying it won't be lifted until the peace campaign is "fully accepted by everyone."

In Sulawesi, the report says, "fighting between Christians and Muslims intensified in November 2001, provoked by the presence of thousands of members of the Laskar Jihad paramilitary group, who began entering the island in July.

"As in the case of the Moluccas, the Indonesian government was accused of neglecting the conflict in Sulawesi in its initial phases and making little effort to halt the violence," the report adds.

The USCIRF says the United States should "continue to press the government of Indonesia to fully disarm all outside militia forces, such as Laskar Jihad, on the Moluccas and Sulawesi."

The report adds the United States should press Jakarta to hold the members of those groups "accountable for the violence" they perpetrated and calls on the United States to urge Jakarta to ensure that "scrupulously neutral and professional troops" operate in the Moluccas and Sulawesi until peace and rule of law take hold there.

The USCIRF says that while there were other conflicts roiling the island nation from Aceh in the west to Papua in the east, the motivating factors were more political, despite the fact that most Papuans were Christian while Indonesia is overwhelmingly Muslim.

In Aceh, the report calls for the United States to "monitor the implementation of Shariah" (Muslim law) to determine if "individual rights and freedoms, including religious freedom, as outlined in international documents are being guaranteed."

If it becomes apparent that such rights are being violated, the report continues, "the U.S. government should press the Indonesian government to oppose the implementation of Shariah in Aceh and elsewhere in the country."

The report also calls on the United States to make clear to Jakarta that when its 1969 Ministerial Decree restricting the building of houses of worship is used by the majority community to prevent a minority group from building a house of worship, the decree is, "in effect, being used to violate religious freedom in Indonesia, particularly of minority religious groups."

The USCIRF points out that while Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim nation, its government is not an Islamic one, and the Indonesian Constitution guarantees religious freedom to the five religions officially recognized by the state -- Islam, Protestantism, Catholicism, Buddhism, and Hinduism, and says other religions, including Judaism, are not forbidden.

A ban on Jehovah's Witnesses was lifted in June 2001, and members of the Bahai faith saw the official ban on their religion lifted in January 2000.

The U.S. Congress established the USCIRF through legislation in 1998 to report on the state of religious freedom in the world and to make recommendations for U.S. policy in the face of religious persecution in various countries in the world. The commission submits those reports to the President, Secretary of State, Speaker of the House and President Pro Tempore of the Senate.

The complete report on Indonesia can be found at the USCIRF website: http://www.uscirf.gov/reports/03May02/Indonesia.pdf.

(The Washington File is a product of the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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