Indonesian Police Make Arrests in Sulawesi

By Kenneth Conboy

Amidst much confusion, the Indonesian authorities apparently made progress this past week in unraveling the extremist network responsible for the gruesome beheading of three Christian high school girls in Poso, Central Sulawesi, last October. By way of background, Poso district has a population almost evenly divided between Christians and Muslims, and was the scene of bloody communal violence during 199-2002. The perpetrators of the beheadings apparently intended—though failed—to re-ignite that violence.

The latest police operation started on 5 May, when they arrested five males in Tolitoli sub-district, Central Sulawesi; confiscated in their rented house were some bullets and books on jihad. The initial police statement claimed that at least two of the five had earlier provided safe haven to top Jemaah Islamiyah fugitive Noordin M. Top on the island of Java.

Three days later, the police recanted their charge that any of the five were linked to Top. Instead, on 8 May they asserted that two of the five were linked to the 2004 murder of a reverend in a Poso church.

Once again, the story did not hold up. On 9 May, the police said that none of the Tolitoli five were linked to the murder of the reverend, but three were involved in the 2004 murder of a soldier’s wife and the October 2005 beheadings. That same day, two other men were placed in custody in Central Sulawesi for the beheadings.

On a roll, members of Indonesia’s counter-terrorist unit, Detachment 88, on 8 May attempted to arrest the alleged mastermind of this crime, 25-year old Taufik Bulaga. But when they placed him under custody after exiting a Poso mosque that morning, dozens of his neighbors poured onto the street, beating the arresting officers and torching two police motorcycles.

As of 12 May, a total of seven men are now in police custody for the beheadings. The police have once again claimed that some of these suspects might be linked to Noordin M. Top, though no other details have been forthcoming. Taufik Bulaga remains at large, with the authorities appealing to the residents of Poso to hand him over.

(All of the above takes place against the backdrop of three Christian militia leaders facing the death sentence for their role in the Poso sectarian violence. This week the three lost their second and last appeal to the Indonesian supreme court, paving their way for their executions to take place at an unannounced time within the next few weeks. As their execution will likely spark outrage among the Christian population in Poso, the reinvigorated crackdown on Islamic radicals in Poso might be seen as the government’s way of showing an equal intolerance of extremism from either community.)

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