Nonmilitary approach best against terror: Workshop

Ivy Susanti, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government should focus on a nonmilitary approach in fighting terrorism to avoid misunderstandings with Islamic groups, a discussion panel concluded on Monday.

To date, 33 Indonesians have been convicted for acts of terror -- mostly in the October 2002 bombings in Bali and last year's JW Marriott Hotel attack in Jakarta -- under Law No. 15/2003 on terrorism. But such measures have not discouraged others from planning similar crimes.

The two-day regional workshop, "Contemporary Islamic Movements in South and Southeast Asia: Roots of Fundamentalism, Networks, Policy and Trend", is being held in Tangerang, Banten.

The seminar was jointly organized by Ridep Institute, a research organization in Jakarta, and Friedrich Eibert Stiftung, a non-governmental organization based in Germany.

S. Yunanto, Ridep Institute's executive director, said that the government should aim at the root of terrorism, which may be social and cultural in nature such as education, and not hastily conclude that religious fundamentalism is the source of terror.

"I want to point out here that not all Muslim activities in this country deserve similar treatment. On the other hand, not all fundamentalism, in the Muslim context, is a problem to the state," he told The Jakarta Post on the sidelines of the workshop on Monday.

A fundamentalist, he said, would use the literal approach to the holy Koran, resulting in a rigid, "anti-interpretation" personality.

"Such an approach may affect his/her political thoughts. It's not a big problem when a fundamentalist wants to introduce religious values in politics, but don't view this as an effort to establish a Muslim country," he said.

But Insp. Gen. Ansyaad Mbai, head of the counterterrorism desk at the Office of the Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs, said that the injustice and oppression may prompt to militancy, besides the literal approach and the misinterpretation of Islamic teachings.

Based on the National Police's investigation into the two aforementioned cases, "... it was learned that one of the motivations of terrorists is to fight injustice and oppression perceived to be carried out by the West, led by the United States."

Therefore, he said, the war against terrorism should be seen as a war of ideas, aiming at accumulating support for respective ideas, through correlative factors such as poverty, education and other social problems.

"We should ask credible religious figures to teach the correct interpretation of Islam. For example, by raising questions such as whether religion teaches us to plant a bomb to kill people? What kind of religious teaching is that? The Ministry of Religious Affairs should initiate this task."

However, he did not rule out the possibility that the effort to stamp out terrorism could sometimes have political considerations.

"Terrorism is a politically motivated crime. The problem is, we are facing a transitional government, meaning all the government's acts may have political considerations. The arrest of a terrorist suspect is just a part of law enforcement, but now it has become a political issue," said Ansyaad, a former North Sumatra Police chief.

Some Madrassa (Islamic boarding schools) and private schools in Pakistan are examples of how their lessons can turn students into perceived militants, radicals and jihadists.

AH Nayyar, a professor of physics at the Quaid-i-Azam University, said that religious fundamentalism had gained popularity in Pakistan, an Islamic state in South Asia, because of a complex interplay of various phenomena, including a quest for identity, security concerns from India and the country's foreign policy objectives.

Former Pakistani leader Gen. Zia-ul-Haq started "Islamized" education in Pakistan in the 1980s, through the curricula and textbooks in public schools on social studies, Urdu, civics and English. They were all compulsory subjects from primary to high school.

"Textbooks in social sciences have doctrinal material aimed at creating a pious Muslim, a patriotic Pakistani and a jihadi out of the student."

He further noted that the effort to fight militants should consider the issue of education. Past lessons taught the country that under Zia's rule, religious fanatics, imbued with the ideals of jihad and shahadat (testimonies), were created to help the United States fight communism, then Kashmiri rebels.

Nayyar mentioned that Gen. Pervez Musharraf had identified law enforcement and a strong security apparatus as ways to tackle the problem of sectarianism and extremism. Pakistan, a close ally of the United States in the war against terror, recently arrested people with suspected links to the al-Qaeda network.