Nun's testimony clears local Moslems, say youths

Nun's testimony clears local Moslems, say youths

JAKARTA (JP): An association of religious youth groups
yesterday revealed new findings from their investigation into the
recent attack on Situbondo churches in East Java, including a
nun's testimony that those who started the fires were not local
Moslems.

Chatibul Umam Wiranu of the Islamic University Students
Movement and his friends from Christian and other groups, said
here yesterday it was impossible that Moslems initiated the Oct.
10 attack on the churches.

Chatibul said the Catholic nun told them that the rabid
arsonists were not local residents, but outsiders connected with
"a big political power (the students) would not dare to mention."
He did not identify the nun, either.

The investigators were from the Indonesian Association of
Christian Intelligentsia, the Christian Youths Movement, the
Islamic University Students Movement, the Nationalist University
Students Movement, the Christian University Students Movement and
the Association of Catholic Students.

They were joined at the press conference announcing their
findings by leaders of the youth wing of Indonesia's largest
Moslem organization Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) whose Situbondo members
were reported to have been involved in the attack.

These groups with other organizations set up a joint committee
called "Solidarity for Situbondo."

Chatibul said the team had also discovered how wrong it would
be to accuse local ulemas of instigating the attack.

"We found that no ulema was involved," he said.

"We have visited three pesantren (Islamic boarding schools),
talked to ulemas, and read their instruction books," he said. "We
learned how deeply religious the students of the pesantren were,
how they were taught 'religious morality', and brotherhood by
their ulemas."

"There is nothing in their book that teaches hatred of other
religions and their symbols," Chatibul said.

Situbondo is a predominantly Moslem regency, and is widely
known as a stronghold of the 30-million-strong Nahdlatul Ulama
led by prominent Abdurarahman Wahid.

Abdurrahman had immediately apologized for the attack which he
believed may have involved NU local members. Another NU leader,
Achmad Bagdja, had expressed regret over the incident but
asserted that the organization was not behind the riots which
claimed five lives.

Yesterday, Chatibul and his friends reiterated their
conviction that the attack could not have been fueled by
religious hatred. The youth leaders agreed that "political
interests of a group or an individual" were behind the attack.

They did not elaborate, but Chatibul said the ill-informed and
poor people of Situbondo were gullible and vulnerable to the
machinations of "those acting for their own political interests."
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