Indonesian Govt Aims to Broker Sampang Shiite Solution

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - The Indonesian government is hoping to forge a lasting solution for a displaced Shiite group from Sampang, East Java, by holding peace talks with their erstwhile neighbors, a minister said on Monday.“[Relocating them to Sidoarjo, East Java] was a temporary solution,” Coordinating Minister of Political, Legal and Security Affairs Djoko Suyanto said. “We are conducting a reconciliation process by holding a meeting between the two groups.”The origins of the case began in August, 2012, when a mob of 500 Salafis attacked a group of Shiite students and teachers with swords and machetes in the village of Nangkernang. Two Shiites were killed and seven others were injured, and the mob also torched dozens of homes belonging to Shiite residents. The homeless Shiites were relocated to a sports center in Sampang for nine months, where conditions were squalid, government food supplies frequently ran short and medical attention was sparse.On June 20, a crowd of angry Salafis amassed outside the sports center following a large outdoor prayer where prominent Salafi preachers decried the Shiites as “heretics” before storming over to the nearby center. The crowd confronted Iklil Al Milal, a local Shiite leader, and demanded the group leave the island. Local police then loaded the community onto waiting buses and trucks and drove them out of town, according to a statement by the People’s Anti-Violence Network (Jamak).Djoko said that the 233 Shiites, who were resettled in government-funded apartments in Sidoarjo, have two options: They can return to Sampang, or they can move into new homes in a different area of Madura island that will be paid for by the state.Rasiyo, the East Java Provincial Secretary said, however, that a timetable for reconciliation cannot be confirmed in the immediate future given the recent history of violence.The Surabaya-based Sunan Ampel State Institute for the Islamic Studies is brokering reconciliation efforts between the two religious communities, and Djoko said President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had instructed the relevant ministries to draw up a plan for the possibility of new housing for the Shiites.Herstaning Ikhlas, a lawyer representing the displaced Shiite group, told on Tuesday that it would be preferable if his clients were able to return home.“The government’s effort to reconcile the conflicting parties should not stop at dialogue,” Herstaning said. “It is a good start, but it’s not enough. They should empower people who were involved in the conflict, such as appointing Sunni religious leaders to take part in rebuilding Shiite houses and village infrastructure such as roads and wells in order to rebuild it on a model of religious harmony.”/129