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A Few Poorly Organised Men Interreligious Violence in Poso, Indonesia Dave McRae Copyright 2013 David McRae Published by Brill in 2013 brill.com/few-poorly-organized-men This pre-print version distributed under the following license: creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0 The pagination of this pre-print version differs from the printed book. Acknowledgements I owe thanks to a great many people without whom I would never have produced this book, or the Ph.D. dissertation on which it is based. First and foremost I must thank Diane Zhang, for her unending support, sharp insights and discerning eye. She did just about everything to make this book possible save writing it for me, so thankyou. I owe special thanks to my Ph.D. supervisor, Virginia Hooker. From the beginning to the end of the dissertation and indeed into her retirement, she read and commented perceptively on each and every draft with unfailing enthusiasm and encouragement. Special thanks also to Robert Cribb, who joined my supervisory panel for the writing up of the dissertation. His advice, comments and criticism were invaluable, and his numerous suggestions of additional interpretations and implications greatly enriched the dissertation and this book based on it. My other supervisor, Amrih Widodo, was a source of interesting ideas in the early stages of research. I’ve been incredibly fortunate to have so many people help me during my stays in Indonesia. Solahudin could not have done more – he made sure things went smoothly the first time I went to Palu, generously gave me the benefit of his unique insights over and over again, and his information and suggestions introduced me to many new aspects of my research. I feel I owe him a debt of kindness I can never hope to come close to repaying. In Central Sulawesi, LPSHAM introduced me to the conflict, gave me a place to stay and spent hour after hour introducing me to people and transporting me around Palu and Poso. Naming names runs the risk of forgetting someone, but thankyou Deddy, Alam, Marthen, Buyunk, Uken, Suaib, Idul, Hong, Ateng, Syawal, Ade, Brant, Intan, Walid, Rommy and the rest. Marthen in particular helped me negotiate the Palu bureaucracy and provided great help with early interviews. Buyunk also provided very helpful research assistance by attending trials in Palu in 2007 and collecting the documents from the proceedings. At YTM, Anto Sangaji has been a tremendous friend during this research. The insights, information, drafts of his work and introductions he has provided have greatly enriched my understanding of Poso. He worked tirelessly during the conflict to help end the violence and stand in the way of those trying to profit from others’ suffering, while at the same time being the conflict's leading observer. Yogie has also been a great and very helpful friend and provided introductions, information and insights without thought of his own time. Others too numerous to mention have given generously of their time and insights – Robert, Darwis, Iskandar, Jemy, Ochan, Darlis, Adhy, Budi and Lian among them. In Jakarta, Adhe has provided diligent and much appreciated research assistance in attending numerous trials and collecting the documents from proceedings. He also took the photograph that appears on the cover of the book. Thankyou also to all the people who read drafts, gave advice, or who generously provided information, introductions, drafts of articles or other help, including Ed Aspinall, Greg Fealy, Marcus Mietzner and Sidney Jones. Chris Wilson deserves special thanks for reading the entire book manuscript and most of my dissertation chapters, as well as generously sending me pre-publication drafts of his fine book on the North Maluku conflict. Thankyou also to my Ph.D. examiners and the two readers appointed by KITLV Press for their careful reading and helpful comments on my Ph.D. and book manuscript respectively. I also thank the series editors Gerry van Klinken and Ed Aspinall for their guidance, and everyone at KITLV Press and Brill. Finally thanks also to my colleagues at the International Crisis Group and the World Bank, each stimulating workplaces where I enriched my understanding of violent conflict and where colleagues were generous with information. Despite the generous contributions of the individuals mentioned above, all shortcomings and errors in this book remain solely my responsibility. Parts of Chapter Four draw on material previously published in my 2007 Indonesia article: ‘Criminal justice and communal conflict; A case study of the trial of Fabianus Tibo, Dominggus da Silva and Marinus Riwu’. Indonesia 83: 79-117. Several paragraphs in Chapter Six also draw on material published in my 2010 article in the Conflict, Security and Development Journal: 'Reintegration and localized conflict; Security impacts beyond influencing spoilers', Conflict, Security and Development 10 (3):403-430. 2 BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: Dave McRae is a Research Fellow in the East Asia Program at the Lowy Institute for International Policy. He has researched conflict, politics, democratisation and human rights issues in Indonesia for well over a decade. He wrote his Ph.D. at the Australian National University on post-authoritarian interreligious violence in Poso, Indonesia. As Lead Researcher for the World Bank’s Conflict and Development Team in Indonesia between 2008 and 2010 he led a research program on interventions to prevent conflict and address its impacts. Prior to this, he worked for the Jakarta office of the International Crisis Group between 2004 and 2006, researching and writing reports on most of Indonesia’s major conflict areas. Contact the author at [email protected] 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter One - Introduction ........................................................................................................ 1 Chapter Two - A Vulnerable District? ..................................................................................... 14 Chapter Three - Political Violence ........................................................................................... 25 Chapter Four - A Division Of Labour In Killing ..................................................................... 48 Chapter Five - Religious Violence ........................................................................................... 84 Chapter Six - State Intervention ............................................................................................. 110 Chapter Seven - Conclusion ................................................................................................... 132 Bibliography ........................................................................................................................... 140 4 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION For nine years from 1998 to 2007, Poso district in Central Sulawesi province became the site of the most protracted inter-religious conflict in post-authoritarian Indonesia. What started as a brawl between two local youths escalated first to urban riots, then to widespread killings and war-like violence, before a long period of sporadic shootings and bombings. Along the way, a little known and sparsely-populated district in the outer islands of Indonesia with no recent history of violence came to global attention as one of the most important theatres of operations for the Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist network. Overall, between 600 and 1000 people were killed out of a pre-conflict population of approximately 400,000 people, and tens of thousands more were displaced amid immense physical destruction. The extent of the destruction wrought during the conflict was captured in a wry local saying, ‘Win and you’re charcoal, lose and you’re ash.’ The onset of violence in Poso coincided with the democratic transition that followed President Suharto’s May 1998 resignation, ending more than 40 years of authoritarian rule in Indonesia. Poso was not the only site to experience large-scale communal fighting during this transition – four other provinces were also rocked by episodes of violence in which several hundred to several thousand people were killed. At a superficial level, this outbreak of violence was not a surprise. Indonesia’s own history and contemporary circumstances contributed to pessimism that unrest would accompany the end of authoritarian rule. Even as the transition began, three of Indonesia’s then 27 provinces were already gripped by long-running separatist insurgencies, each of which intensified as the central authoritarian regime fell. Moreover, the previous two instances of regime change, in 1945-9 and 1965-6, had been accompanied by periods of widespread social violence. In comparative terms, furthermore, countries in the midst of democratization are often observed to be particularly prone to communal violence (Snyder 2000; van Klinken 2007). Equally, however, no one had predicted that the pattern of violence during the transition would be defined by large-scale outbreaks of communal fighting in Indonesia’s outer islands. Indeed it is barely possible that such a prediction could have been made, given the unfamiliarity to that point of both the forms and locations of large-scale violence. Communal fighting had been mostly absent under Suharto’s regime, with the two exceptions of anti- Chinese violence and, at the very end of authoritarian rule, an episode of ethnic violence in West Kalimantan province in 1997. Each eventual site of communal conflict had also been wholly anonymous in national affairs. Even within Indonesia and well after fighting in Poso