Indonesia Backgrounder: Jihad in Central Sulawesi

Jakarta/Brussels  |   3 Feb 2004

Recent violence in Central Sulawesi highlights the nature and gravity of the terrorist threat in Indonesia. Analysis suggests that while the shorter-term prospects are somewhat encouraging, there is an under-appreciated, longer-term security risk.

The International Crisis Group’s latest report, Indonesia Backgrounder: Jihad in Central Sulawesi,* takes as a starting point an outbreak of violence in Poso and Morowali districts in October 2003 in which thirteen people were killed, most of them Christian villagers. Most of the attackers proved to be locally recruited men from the Mujahidin KOMPAK militia group, and most had family members killed in a wave of attacks on Muslims in May-June 2000 and were likely motivated by revenge.

Mujahidin KOMPAK is an organisation that was spawned by Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), had JI members among its leaders, but was institutionally distinct from South East Asia’s largest terrorist organisation. In trying to piece together why it was created and how it had come to Poso, ICG uncovered new information about rifts within JI.

“JI is not a monolithic organisation with a single set of goals”, says Sidney Jones, South East Asia Project Director for ICG. “There are serious differences over how, when, and where to wage jihad, and the gap appears to be widening”.

The report found that Mujahidin KOMPAK and JI cooperated and competed in Poso. Both aimed to strengthen local groups for jihad so that they do not need outside assistance, but their approaches differed significantly. JI insisted on religious indoctrination as an absolute prerequisite to war; Mujahidin KOMPAK focused on “learning by doing” and getting recruits into battle as fast as possible. “JI was viewed as slow and bureaucratic”, says Jones. “Mujahidin KOMPAK was seen as leaner, meaner and quicker”.

The rivalry between the two reflects a much deeper split within JI. On one side is a more radical element associated with Hambali, pushing for attacks on Western targets. On the other is what may be the majority faction of JI, which sees such attacks as undermining a longer-term strategy to establish an Islamic state in Indonesia and is focused on building a mass base through religious outreach and recruitment.

“If the men in the Hambali faction can be captured – and several key figures are still at large – the immediate threat of another Bali- or Marriott-style attack by JI in Indonesia could substantially ease”, says Robert Templer, Director of ICG’s Asia Program. “But the longer-term threat comes from local organisations with local grievances and lethal skills, such as the Mujahidin KOMPAK group in Poso, and from the possibility of another radical faction emerging from within the anti-Hambali faction of JI”.

ICG stresses that the terrorist threat needs to be kept in perspective – all of these groups remain the radical fringe of the radical fringe, and Indonesia is not about to be overrun with jihadists. At the same time, much more effort needs to go into understanding the recruitment and indoctrination processes that keep these organisations alive and into reforming the justice system so that some of the grievances that radical groups feed on can be addressed.