Straits Times / Singapore June 28, 2010 MPs reject Islamist vigilantes
JAKARTA - INDONESIAN lawmakers on Monday demanded the government crack down on a violent Islamist vigilante group that has threatened 'war' against Christians in Jakarta and urged mosques to set up militia forces. Parliamentarians from various parties held a press conference to demand the government outlaw the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) - a private militia with a self-appointed mission to protect 'Islamic' values in the secular country. 'The only way to stop the FPI from creating anarchy is to ban it. The FPI is not registered as an official group,' lawmaker Eva Kusuma Sundari of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle told the news conference. 'The police, military and government should be held responsible for their role in creating the FPI. Now they're incapable in controlling it,' she added, referring to the group's origins in a 1990s paramilitary outfit. The FPI warned on Sunday that it was ready to wage war against Christians in the outer Jakarta suburb of Bekasi over claims of 'Christianisation' of the mainly Muslim area. After a meeting of Muslim leaders, FPI extremists urged Bekasi authorities to introduce Islamic syariah law and warned they would attack Christians with sticks, rocks and even flagpoles unless the 'Christianisation' ceased. -- AFP
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