An LA Times article discusses the “the fear and frustration of being Christian in Indonesia”.

In Christians Don’t Expect Eye for an Eye in Indonesia (registration required), a cherry-picking piece by John M. Glionna, a Christian in Bali is described as bemoaning the execution of Fabianus Tibo, et al, last month and “talks in measured words about the fear and frustration of being Christian in the world’s most populous Muslim nation.” Maringan Simanjuntak is said to be now anxiously awaiting another execution, that of the 2002 Bali bombers, Amrozi, Imam Samudra, Ali Gufron.

But Simanjuntak, a 46-year-old tour guide, doesn’t expect to see the Bali bombers put to death – the country’s Muslim-led government takes care of its own, he thinks.

This country is a Muslim majority, and Christians are not offered the same protection under the law.

The article then goes on to say that many Christians believe the execution of Tibo and friends was unjust, they were offered up as scapegoats, and, as Robert Tibo says,:

I miss my father. But what can we do? We cannot fight the government. But it seemed officials were trying to pave the way for the Bali bombers’ execution. They wanted to make it even between my father and the other Christians and the Muslims.

Moving to Sulawesi Sidney Jones of the International Crisis Group is quoted:

For many Christians, there is a question of balance. …there is this strong sense among non-Muslim minorities that they may not have a place in Indonesia.

Muslims convicted in Sulawesi were given at most 15-year prison sentences, she says.

Bali is not immune from these events, it is said. Tourism is still badly affected by past terrorist attacks there. Nyoman Puana, camera shop employee, says the bombers robbed Balinese people of their livelihoods.

The bombs crushed tourism all the way to the bottom. People want to see justice take its course.

In the past, the writer says, Suharto suppressed Indonesia’s simmering religious and ethnic rivalries but after his fall in 1998, distrust boiled over in Sulawesi, where Muslims and Christians live in roughly even numbers.

What follows in the article is then a rather confused conflating of events, of things separated by many years. We are told that the violence began in Poso, originally, when a rumour among Christians spread that Muslims had tried to ban alcohol. Violence spread, and included the beheadings of three Christian schoolgirls, something which actually happened four years after the Malino peace accord, and six years after the original outbreak of fighting.

Some people were later brought to trial. “The Christians”, known as the Poso Three, were found guilty of several attacks, including a machete and gun assault on an Islamic school that left at least 70 dead.

After their execution there were many protests, and many people were unhappy with how the executions were done, and how the corpses were treated by the authorities.

There was no violence in Bali but, the writer claims, “emotions still run high” there.

Hubert Hady Setiawan, said to be a priest, is quoted as sympathising with the post Tibo execution violence and protests:

If you were there, you would understand. Perhaps people did not act reasonably, but they saw an injustice. We on the outside have to accept the violence “” eye for eye, tooth for tooth.

Suliaman, a Muslim (in Bali it seems), is quoted as saying that the violence was provoked by paid provocateurs. Then he says:

Not all Muslims are good. I travel throughout Indonesia, and most of the mosques I visit are empty. People need to return to the teachings of Islam and reject violence.

The article ends by returning to Maringan Simanjuntak who is said to be still waiting for the Bali bombers to die.

They stole the last breaths of 202 people. They deserve to be punished. They deserve to die.