On the increasing Islamisation of Indonesia, from Andreas Harsono at (surprisingly) CiF:
Here’s a seasonal snapshot from Indonesia’s Aceh province: on 20 December, dozens of militant Islamists rallied outside one of the largest hotels in Banda Aceh, the provincial capital, threatening violence if the hotel management attempted to organise Christmas or New Year’s Eve celebrations. The protest was to support an edict from the province’s leading Islamic cleric’s organization, the Consultative Ulama Council, prohibiting Muslims from any recognition of the Christmas season.
Hostility to Christmas is, of course, nothing new among Islamic clerics.
An October 2007 regulation in Aceh on the construction of houses of worship has resulted in unreasonable limitations on the ability of religious minorities to build and renovate churches and temples. In May 2012 alone, that law prompted authorities to forcibly close 17 Christian churches and a house of worship for one of Aceh’s many indigenous native faiths. On 17 June 2012 Islamist militants destroyed the GBI Peunayong Protestant church on the pretext that it was illegal. Governor Irwandi Yusuf had inflamed the situation by declaring in May 2011 that several non-Sunni sects and religions followed “deviant teachings.”
Such intolerance is becoming distressingly common across Indonesia. Indonesia's Setara Institute, which monitors religious freedom in Indonesia, documented 243 incidents of physical violence in the first 10 months of 2013, compared with 264 in all of 2012, up from 216 in 2010.
Women in Aceh are under siege from four Sharia-inspired criminal bylaws enacted in July 2003 that impose punitive restrictions on freedom of association and expression. These laws apply to both women and men, but local activists say that the Sharia police, who enforce them, apply them more often and more harshly against women and girls.
One of the laws imposes “seclusion,” making it a crime for two adults of the opposite sex who are not married or related by blood to be together in an isolated place. This broadly worded law has been interpreted to prohibit merely sitting and talking in a quiet space with a member of the opposite sex. The authorities have even targeted people eating or studying together. Sharia police officials say they sometimes force women and girls suspected of violating the seclusion law to submit to “virginity exams,” which are invasive and demeaning. Violators face between three and nine lashes from a rattan cane.
Another restrictive bylaw imposes “Islamic” public dress requirements for Muslims. In practice it imposes far more onerous restrictions on women, requiring them to cover their hair with the hijab headscarf in public and forbidding them from wearing body-hugging clothing. In Banda Aceh, the Sharia police regularly organise sweeps against women with tight jeans. Aceh’s Sharia police chief told Human Rights Watch, “We focus on everybody, but it’s usually women that make mistakes.” Police arrested Putri Erlina, 16, in 2012, allegedly for violating her town’s seclusion law. After local media reported her arrest, Erlina wrote a note saying she could not endure the shame and hanged herself.
A series of bylaws enacted in recent years in Aceh’s 23 regencies have further restricted women’s rights. The city of Lhokseumawe rolled out a regulation last January banning women from straddling motorcycles – only riding side-saddle is permitted. In neighboring Bireuen, a local regulation enacted in May prohibits women from dancing. In Meulaboh, in western Aceh, a decree imposed in January 2010 forbids women from wearing pants.
The mayor of Lhokseumawe gave his reasons for the new regulations - "Women sitting on motorbikes must not sit astride because it will provoke the male driver....We want to save women from things that will cause them to violate shariah law. We wish to honour women with this ban because they are delicate creatures".
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