Maluku Conflict Reaches Critical New Phase

Maluku Conflict Reaches Critical New Phase
State of Emergency Declared After 3000 Muslim Fighters Massacre Christians

by Alex Buchan

LONDON (Compass) -- Religious tensions in eastern Indonesia's Maluku province spun out of control as the 18-month-long civil war between Muslims and Christians reached a critical new phase in June.

A force of 3000 Muslim fighters with heavy artillery began massacring hundreds of Christians in mid June, prompting Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid to declare a civil state of emergency on June 26. His refusal to declare martial law reflects an unwillingness to give total control to army generals, whose soldiers are accused by Christians of joining the newly arrived Muslim jihad brigades.

However, it is hard to classify the conflict purely in terms of persecution, as both Muslim and Christian communities have been guilty of slaughtering each other.

Analysts in Jakarta talk of the conflict entering a fourth phase since trouble broke out in Maluku province in January 1999. The first phase saw fighting confined to southern Maluku, on the island and city of Ambon, with some hundreds killed. The violence subsided after April 1999.

Then in July 1999 the conflict erupted again, increasing the total number of casualties to over a thousand. In the third phase last Christmas, the war re-ignited and spread to northern Maluku, engulfing other islands such as Ternate and Halmahera.

The current fourth phrase is the result of a force of heavily armed Muslim jihad fighters who had traveled into Maluku in April and May this year after being trained on Java island. Their presence has altered the military balance significantly. Local police in many areas do not have the ammunition to protect Christian populations, who are now fleeing en masse, whereas before the refugees were predominantly Muslim.

The jihad fighters struck on June 19-20, attacking the Christian village of Duma on Halmahera Island. According to the best evidence, they massacred 176 villagers, a further 137 were maimed, 292 houses were burned, and 10 women and children are still missing and believed killed.

At the same time, Ambon again became the scene of fierce street fighting between the Muslim warriors and a violent Christian resistance movement. The Christian University Campus of Ambon was destroyed. In northern Maluku, thousands fled, often onto boats, one of which sunk under the weight of too many passengers on June 29. Almost 500 Christians were drowned.

The build up of Muslim fighters had been noted, and hard questions are being asked of the Jakarta government as to why they were unable to stop such a large force filtering into Maluku.

For months Muslim extremists openly raised funds in Javanese cities, stopping cars and asking people to "contribute to the jihad against Christians in Maluku." Further information has emerged that hundreds if not thousands of the new force were trained just outside Jakarta. And the fact that they were able to sneak into Maluku and suddenly acquire the kind of heavy military equipment such as rocket launchers and automatic rifles smacks of military collusion, according to some.

Maluku's Christian leaders have lost patience with the authorities. The Roman Catholic auxiliary bishop of Ambon, Joseph Tethool and the Rev. Sammay Titaley, chairman of the Board of the Synod of Protestant Churches in the Moluccas, released a joint statement June 29 complaining of the "contemptible and inhuman" assault on Christians by the armed forces working hand in glove with Muslim jihad fighters.

Even the international human rights community is starting to give Ambon the kind of attention they only gave to East Timor before.

The U.S.-based Human Rights Watch released a report June 29 alleging that "Soldiers have broken ranks and joined the fighting as partisans, and as a result, Indonesian troops right now have virtually no credibility in areas where a neutral force is most desperately needed."

Indonesia's government, though steadfastly refusing to countenance U.N. intervention, admitted that sections of the army had indeed sided with the new Muslim force. Brigadier General Tono Suratman admitted there were "rogue elements" in the 10,200 troops in Maluku, and another government spokesperson said there were plans to immediately withdraw 1,400 of the most partisan troops.

There are two main theories to explain the violence on Maluku, and they are not mutually exclusive. The first is the "orchestration theory," which is particularly pushed by Christians. It claims that Muslim extremists and disaffected pro-Suharto military factions orchestrated the violence in order to bring down the Wahid government, with a view to installing a strong-arm Islamic regime instead. Many feel that the violence will continue until at least mid August, when the Parliament meets and theoretically could force the resignation of Wahid.

The second theory is the "explosion theory," favored more, though not exclusively, by Muslim observers. Here the view is that over the past 20 years, the overwhelming majority enjoyed by the Christian community in Maluku was steadily eroded by the Suharto government, who sent in hundreds of thousands of Muslims, and then in the 1990's removed Christians from positions of leadership and replaced them with Muslims.

Christian resentment built up to such a point, the argument goes, that they felt they had to drive Muslims out or they would be overwhelmed. What began as a spontaneous riot in Ambon was fueled then by the belief among Maluku Christians that now was the time to stop Muslim dominance.

Both views have hard evidence to back them up, but the polarization between the views has not been helped by biased reporting.

The Indonesian press is Muslim dominated and has made inflammatory accusations about Christians massacring Muslims, but rarely mentions Muslim atrocities. The international press has lamentably failed to understand the difference between a committed Christian and an ethnic Christian. And even the overseas Christian press tends to report on Maluku as primarily a "persecuted Christians" case, and seems unaware of the massacres the Christian community has committed, and are even surprised to be told that until recently, the 100,000 refugees who fled the fighting were overwhelmingly Muslim.

No doubt there are many genuine Christian believers caught in the crossfire, but as persecution specialist Brother Andrew recently declared, "If Christians are killing Muslims as well as Muslims killing Christians, that's not persecution, it's civil war!"

Said a Jakarta pastor, "There is persecution in Maluku, but don't overplay it and try to present Christians as the victims -- that's what the Muslims do. They say the Muslims are the victims. The fact is, the Christian church leadership has zero influence on the Christian community of Maluku now, and there is blood everywhere. Christians have shed it. Muslims have shed it. It's time to recognize the truth."