The Foreign Service Journal, May 2018

58 MAY 2018 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL organized transmigration of Indonesians from other islands to West Papua has marginalized the native Papuans as resources and assistance programs are diverted to the new arrivals. For the most part, local resistance has been nonviolent, yet security forces often attack peaceful demonstrations. There is a small armed movement, but it is largely rural and poorly armed; it targets security force personnel and installations, as well as some corporations exploiting West Papua’s vast economic riches. In response, the Indonesian military conducts sweeps that force whole villages to flee to surrounding forests and mountains, where they have inadequate access to food, medical assistance and shelter. In addition, Indonesian special forces murdered the Papuans’ most prominent nationalist leader, Theys Eluay, in 2001. The perpetrators received minimal sentences. The Indonesian government has long impeded coverage of its pervasive human rights abuses in West Papua. In policies and practices that have not changed substantially since the Suharto era, the government prevents journalists, researchers, human rights monitors and others from traveling to and working in the province. Through a “clearing house” comprised of secu- rity forces and various government ministries and agencies, it severely restricts access; those few observers allowed to visit endure restrictive itineraries and invasive monitoring. Papuans believed by the government to have cooperated with journalists and human rights monitors are singled out for harsh, extra-legal retribution. Through these restrictions, the post-Suharto administra- tions have prevented international monitoring of crimes against humanity extending to ethnic cleansing and what knowledgeable observers have described as “creeping genocide” in West Papua. Like his predecessors, Pres. Widodo has pledged to reform Indo- nesia’s approach to dealing with Papuans, but these pledges have yet to bear fruit. The Challenge of Ethnic Diversity The Suharto dictatorship recognized the potential for insta- bility posed by the archipelago’s religious, ethnic and racial diversity. While the dictatorship enshrined Javanese dominance of this multiethnic society, it carefully balanced and contained potential challenges to the system, especially as posed by the dominant faith, Islam (87 percent of Indonesians are Muslim). Leading Islamic organizations, notably Nhadlatul Ulama, played a central role throughout the Suharto era in creating space for religious tolerance among Indonesia’s Buddhist, Hindu, Chris- tian and Islamic confessions. In the latter years of Suharto’s reign and since, however, foreign funding for establishment of Islamic boarding schools (called pesantren) and other Islamic institutions has grown sig- nificantly. Most of that funding has come from Arab Persian Gulf states and has promoted the ultraconservative Islamic doctrine of Wahhabism. Indonesia’s history of tolerance among Islamic sects and toward non-Islamic faiths, based on Indonesia’s founding plural- ist philosophical principle of Pancasila, is diminishing. A growing intolerance has not only fueled anti-Christian prejudice, but has targeted other Islamic groups, notably the Shia, Ahmadiyya and Kebatinan (a syncretic amalgam incorporating Hindu and Bud- dhist traditions). Anti-Christian prejudice is fueled in part by the significant proportion of Indonesian Christians who are of Chinese ethnic background. The Chinese-Indonesian community has often been a scapegoat in times of political and social tension because of the wealth they are reputed to possess. For example, during the widespread street violence that preceded the 1998 downfall of the Suharto regime, organized in part by elements in the Indo- nesian military, Chinese communities were specific targets. And in 2017, Vice President Jusuf Kalla claimed that “inequality” was driven by religious differences. The emergence of militant Islamic groups, such as the Islamic Defenders Front, Hizbut, Tahrir Indonesia and Laskar Jihad has further undermined Indonesia’s traditional tolerance. Several of these groups have benefited from cooperative relations with the Indonesian military, enabling them to commit violence against religious and secular organizations, businesses and individuals who do not adhere to their strict religious precepts. The intrusion of religious and ethnic intolerance into Indone- sian politics appears to be escalating. In 2017 Basuki Tjahaja Pur- nama (aka Ahok)—the governor (mayor) of Jakarta, one of the most powerful political positions in the country—was defeated in a re-election bid. Ahok had been vice governor of Jakarta and Corrupt and impervious to calls for its accountability before the Indonesian judiciary, the Indonesian military conducts itself very much as a Suharto-era institution.