Sectarian mob attack in Java
Source: Agencies |
February 7, 2011, Monday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
A MACHETE-WIELDING mob of Muslims yesterday attacked the home of a minority sect leader in central Indonesia, killing three and wounding six others, police and witnesses said.
Local police chief Lieutenant Colonel Alex Fauzy Rasyad said about 1,500 people - many armed - attacked about 20 members of the Ahmadiyah Muslim sect who were visiting their leader at his house in Banten province on Indonesia's main island of Java.
He said the crowd demanded that the sect members stop their activities, but the request was rejected. As a result, the crowd stabbed to death at least three men, destroyed the house and set fire to their cars and motorbikes. Six others were hospitalized, four with critical injuries.
The attack was the latest targeting the Ahmadiyah sect in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. Many Muslims see followers of Ahmadiyah as holding -heretical beliefs.
Indonesia is a secular country with a long history of religious tolerance. But in recent years a hard-line fringe has grown louder and the government has been accused of caving in to it.
The Islamic Defenders Front pressured local authorities late last year to shutter a Christian church located in a densely populated Muslim area, and assailants stabbed Christian worshippers and beat a minister in the head with a wooden plank as they headed to prayers.
Ahmadiyah, believed to have 200,000 followers in Indonesia, is considered -deviant by most Muslims and banned in many Islamic countries because of its belief that -Muhammad was not the final prophet.
Local police chief Lieutenant Colonel Alex Fauzy Rasyad said about 1,500 people - many armed - attacked about 20 members of the Ahmadiyah Muslim sect who were visiting their leader at his house in Banten province on Indonesia's main island of Java.
He said the crowd demanded that the sect members stop their activities, but the request was rejected. As a result, the crowd stabbed to death at least three men, destroyed the house and set fire to their cars and motorbikes. Six others were hospitalized, four with critical injuries.
The attack was the latest targeting the Ahmadiyah sect in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. Many Muslims see followers of Ahmadiyah as holding -heretical beliefs.
Indonesia is a secular country with a long history of religious tolerance. But in recent years a hard-line fringe has grown louder and the government has been accused of caving in to it.
The Islamic Defenders Front pressured local authorities late last year to shutter a Christian church located in a densely populated Muslim area, and assailants stabbed Christian worshippers and beat a minister in the head with a wooden plank as they headed to prayers.
Ahmadiyah, believed to have 200,000 followers in Indonesia, is considered -deviant by most Muslims and banned in many Islamic countries because of its belief that -Muhammad was not the final prophet.
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