Burning Times Come to Indonesia
Jenny
jennyg@compuserve.com
Tue Oct 20 20:40:42 1998
Hi everyone,*p*I got this post from a mailing list, which cut it from the NY Times.  The people in Indonesia could really use our prayers at the moment.*p*Jenny*p**br******************p**br*NY Times*br*  *p*October 20, 1998*p**br*Fears of Sorcerers Spur Killings in Java*p*By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF*p*UREN, Indonesia -- Shrieking triumphantly and waving bloody sickles and knives, about 30 motorcyclists drove slowly through town in a victory celebration. Onlookers cheered and the atmosphere was half-exultant, like that of a carnival. *p*Nicholas D. Kristof / The New York Times  *p*Motorcyclists in Turen dragging a corpse.*br*Click on image to see full photo. Please note: This image is graphic and may disturb some viewers. *br*------------------------------------------------------------------ *p*But it was also half-terrified, because one of the motorcyclists was waving a bamboo stake on which was impaled the head of a young man. *p*"Allahu akbar!" the motorcyclists shouted, waving their sickles in*br*celebration at having killed a man they regarded as a sorcerer. "God is great!" *p*The parade here in this remote farm town, 400 miles southeast of the*br*capital, Jakarta, was part of a ferocious hysteria that is sweeping some remote parts of Indonesia. Communities are so terrified of black magic that vigilante groups are forming daily to seize, torture and execute anyone suspected of being a sorcerer. *p*Suspicions are easily aroused, and people are attacked because they are outsiders, lack identification or cannot quickly convince a mob that they have business in the area. *p*At least 150 people, and perhaps many more, have died so far in the frenzy, and law and order have broken down almost completely in some areas. The convulsions have disrupted commerce, paralyzed travel in places and underscored the risks of social upheaval as Indonesia grapples with economic depression and a transition away from political dictatorship. *p*The upheavals are a challenge to the fragile government of President B.J. Habibie, who took office in May when the country's longtime dictator, Suharto, stepped down. Indonesian democracy is still in its infancy, and many people point to the latest killings as an ominous reminder that the last political transition here, in 1965 and '66, was accompanied by violence that cost hundreds of thousands of lives. *p*The cycle of killings began with the slayings of dozens of Muslim leaders, for reasons that are probably political but remain unclear. These killings are attributed to people with supernatural powers, and now the villagers' efforts to avenge the deaths with retaliatory murders have been exploding out of control. And in an echo of 1965, the chaos has also stirred the occasional revenge murder by people taking advantage of the unrest to settle a score. *p*Nicholas D. Kristof / The New York Times  *p*Indonesians like Choirul, a mentally disabled young man seen here with his mother, Siti Chatijah, add to the fear by describing sightings of ninja, or sorcerers, who are believed to be able to turn themselves into animals. *br*-------------------------------------------------------------------*p*The turmoil is on a far smaller scale than in the 1960s but it is just as difficult to comprehend. The epicenter has moved to the Turen area, where five people accused of sorcery were executed by mobs on Sunday. One was beaten to death, one was burned and three were beheaded, with the severed heads paraded along a 40-mile route. *p*Again on Monday at least three people in the area were killed. Two had been seized from a police car by vigilantes who reportedly slit their throats, and the third was the man whose head was paraded on a stake. An hour after that parade, another group of motorcyclists drove by slowly, cheering lustily and dragging the man's naked, headless corpse behind them. *p*"The ninja is dead!" the lead motorcyclist shouted exuberantly, as*br*passers-by waved and shouted encouragement. *p*"Ninja" is the word given here to secret assassins who are believed to be trying to kill Muslim leaders. The original ninja were secret Japanese fighters hundreds of years ago, and Indonesia's ninja apparently got the name because they are feared for their stealth and strength. But they also are believed to be sorcerers who can vanish or turn into animals. *p*The atmosphere is so tense and fearful that even the police stay out of sight and let the mobs rampage. Anyone who seems out of place risks instant execution at the hands of angry crowds. *p*"It begins when people try to chase someone suspicious," explained*br*Sukiando, a 42-year-old rickshaw driver who said he was in the mob that beheaded one suspect on Sunday. "Sometimes the ninja turns into a cat, and sometimes he stays human. If he stays human, then they cut off his head." *p*"There are going to be more heads chopped off," added Sukiando, who like many Indonesians uses just one name. "Because in every little area, there are seven or eight ninja who go out every night, and they've got to be stopped." *p*It is difficult to gather reliable information about the killings, because the authorities and villagers alike are often close-lipped about them. But interviews in several areas of the eastern part of the main Indonesian island of Java suggest that the situation is becoming tenser almost daily. *p*In a vivid demonstration of the new lawlessness, young men in many towns and villages in eastern Java have organized themselves into armed patrols, especially at night, to catch ninja and kill them. Senior police officials in this area said that they could not comment, but one officer in the town of Kepanjen said nervously that the situation was extremely dangerous. *p*"Every night it's like a curfew," he said, referring to the area around his town. "No one goes out and there are patrols every 20 meters. Last night I had to go out for a drive, and I was stopped and checked every 20 meters by crowds of people. Even though I'm a policeman, some guys asked for some cigarettes that they saw I had, and I had to hand them over. They could do anything." *p*The officer said that residents had turned in eight suspected ninja to the police, who were holding them in jail. But he said that the eight were simply mentally disturbed and did not possess supernatural powers. *p*"There are no ninja here," he said. "There is no such thing here." *p*Many people, however, believe the killings confirm the existence of ninja and the need for extreme caution. *p*"When they parade the head around, it's not meant to threaten people," said Mohammed Soleh, a 34-year-old vigilante who was cheering the procession.  "It's just meant to show everyone that ninja do exist and that we must be on alert." *p*The unrest began slowly a few months ago in the area around Banyuwangi, on the eastern tip of Java near the resort island of Bali. Well-organized groups of assassins dressed in black -- the ninja -- began attacking particular targets, often Muslim leaders affiliated with the country's largest Islamic organization, Nahdlatul Ulama. *p*Indonesia is an overwhelmingly Muslim country, and there is no obvious*br*reason that Nahdlatul Ulama, primarily a religious organization, would be a target. Still, some political motive is widely suspected, although there is great debate and uncertainty about what it might be. *p*The organization's leader, Gus Dur, who is widely venerated in Indonesia, said over the weekend that top politicians -- including Cabinet members -- were behind the attacks on Muslims leaders, although he did not say whom he meant or how he had come to that conclusion. *p*Gen. Wiranto, the army commander and perhaps the most powerful person in Indonesia today, visited eastern Java on Sunday and pledged to curb the killings. But he declined to comment on the accusation that senior*br*politicians were involved. *p*"I do not want to send the country toward disintegration," The Jakarta Post quoted Wiranto as saying. *p*The army has sent some patrols into the area, and in daytime there is*br*nervous traffic that evaporates at dusk. The government says that about 150 people have been killed so far, but unofficial estimates are higher and some of the killings go unreported. *p*The ruling political apparatus sometimes engaged in extrajudicial killings during Suharto's days, and many believe that some political or military forces are continuing the tradition, either to eliminate Muslim critics or to sow chaos and create the conditions for a coup. *p*In the last couple of weeks, the killings have spread to encompass most of East Java, and scattered attacks have been reported in other parts of Java as well. But the pattern has changed, so that often those doing the killing now are the mobs trying to find the ninja. *p*"Everybody now is committed to the search for ninja," said Warsidi, a*br*55-year-old man who was eating soup and noodles from an outdoor stall, and who took a break to watch the severed-head parade go by before resuming his meal. "The ninja are trying to kill the Muslim leaders, so before the ninja can do harm, local people are fighting back." *p*Warsidi and other vigilantes were only slightly suspicious of a foreign reporter, apparently the first foreigner to visit the area since the mob killings, and they were generally courteous and mild-mannered. Their politeness seemed incongruous, considering that they were describing their plans to behead anyone who could not satisfactorily explain himself. *p*No foreigners are known to have encountered difficulties in East Java, and most of the killings have been in rural areas that foreigners do not usually visit. Places like Bali and Jakarta have not been affected. *p*However, one suspected sorcerer was attacked and beaten by a huge mob in Surabaya, the hub of the region and Indonesia's second-largest city. Local people became suspicious of the man, rumors started, and he was chased down, tortured, and killed by garroting. *p*A few days earlier in Surabaya, an undercover policeman who was wearing black was saved from a lynching only by running into a police station. A mob attacked and damaged the police station, but the man was saved. *p*So how does one tell who is a ninja? *p*"They look like crazy men, and we also look to see if they have any holy writing on them, because that would mean that they practice black magic," said Bantur, a vigilante rickshaw driver. *p*Bantur and his friends, who said that they had all been in the mob that beheaded a sorcerer a day earlier, clustered around to offer a few other telltale signs. One, they said, is a reluctance to explain one's identity or an inability to explain one's purpose in visiting the area. *p*Belief in magical powers has always been fairly widespread among Javanese living in small towns and villages, but with the decline of strongman rule, there seems to be an increasing willingness to attribute problems to a sorcerer's magic -- and to settle the problem immediately by picking up a sickle. Few people doubt that the ninja must be dispatched quickly, because of their ability to disappear. *p*"Last night, I saw it with my own eyes," said Sutaryona, a 27-year-old*br*member of a vigilante patrol. "There were three ninja, and when we shone a flashlight at them, they vanished." *p*Of course, vanishing is what anyone might try to do when approached by a mob of angry men with sickles. But fleeing is considered proof that one is a ninja. *p*Asked whether the failure of the dead men to vanish in time meant that they were not ninja after all, a group of vigilantes took the question*br*gracefully. They carefully explained that when a Muslim leader is present and knows about the magic, the sorcerer cannot use it. *p*So, they concluded, a suspect's failure to disappear is also proof that he is a sorcerer. *p*In the 1960s, the main victims of the violence were leftists and ethnic Chinese, but that seems not to have been repeated here. The government has suggested that communists -- the perennial targets of Indonesian repression -- are responsible for the ninja killings, but nobody seems to take that very seriously, and Chinese appear to have been spared so far. *p*There are constant sightings of ninja. Near the city of Pandaan, for*br*example, villagers claimed they saw two ninja who, when chased, turned*br*themselves into cats. *p*"So they killed the cats, but there was no blood at all," whispered Tantri Irawati, a 21-year-old woman wearing a Mickey Mouse shirt and red polish on her fingernails and toenails. "Every night people are so scared! I used to go to the toilet outside at night without any fear, but now I'm too terrified. I get someone to walk me to the outhouse." *p*One person in the area, Choirul, a 19-year-old man who is mentally*br*retarded, supposedly was accosted by a ninja. His speech is barely*br*understandable, but he sat on his porch and -- helped by his more voluble mother -- told how a man in black had grabbed his arm and asked him a question. *p*What question? *p*Choirul will not tell anyone, even his mother, and that is taken as further proof that the ninja must have been particularly devilish. So the neighbors have stepped up patrols. *p*"If we catch a ninja, we'll beat him," said Hadi, a 25-year-old neighbor who said he arms himself with a sickle each evening. "People don't want the ninja arrested. They want us to kill him right away." *p*