Wednesday 13 December 2017

Nikkei Asian Review/Gwen Robinson and Simon Roughneen: Religious extremism poses threat to ASEAN's growth

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December 13, 2017 3:14 pm JST
Cover story

Religious extremism poses threat to ASEAN's growth

Aided by social media, hardliners gain mainstream support

GWEN ROBINSON, Chief editor, and SIMON ROUGHNEEN, Asia regional correspondent

Buddhist monks protest the visit of a U.N. official in Yangon on Jan. 16, 2015. According to local media reports, they were angry that the international organization had urged the government to give members of the Rohingya minority citizenship. © Reuters

YANGON/JAKARTA -- With Mt. Agung billowing volcanic ash into the sky above his home in Bali, Khairy Susanto was unsure if he could fly back after joining tens of thousands of fellow Indonesian Islamists at a rally near the presidential palace in Jakarta.

"Inshallah, we can fly, but it doesn't matter, we will be OK," Susanto said. "We are happy to be here today to celebrate our victory."

The Dec. 2 event marked a year since an estimated half-million people clamored in the rain for the arrest of Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, the then-governor of Jakarta. Since then, Purnama, a Protestant of Chinese descent nicknamed Ahok, lost the gubernatorial election and was sentenced to two years in jail on the same blasphemy charges that brought massive crowds onto Jakarta's streets late last year.

The episode raised concerns around the world that Indonesia's relatively tolerant variant of Islam -- and its secular democracy -- was under attack. And it was a startling display of the strength of Islamist groups in Indonesia, home to the world's largest Muslim population. Among the organizers were the Islamic Defenders Front, known as FPI, and the Islamic Ummah Forum.

Members of the Islamic Defenders Front protest the accession of Basuki Tjahaja Purnama -- an ethnic-Chinese Christian nicknamed Ahok -- as governor of Jakarta in November 2014. The sign reads "Ahok is the enemy of Islam." © Reuters

Those groups do not claim affiliation with the al-Qaida-linked militants who killed 202 people in Bali in 2002, nor the estimated 1,150 Indonesians who traveled to Syria and Iraq to fight for the so-called Islamic State. But the government has been sufficiently alarmed to ban the local wing of Hizbut Tahrir, another Islamist movement involved in the anti-Ahok protests -- and which hopes to establish a caliphate.

Across Asia, the rise of hard-line religious movements is fueling a macho form of nationalism and creating dangerous new fault lines in communities. Beyond Indonesia with its numerous Islamist groups are Myanmar's zealous Buddhist organizations, which have stoked anti-Muslim sentiment to deadly effect. Bangladesh has seen the rise of Islamic fundamentalists including Hefazat-e-Islam, while Sri Lanka has Bodu Bala Sena, a radical Sinhalese Buddhist group.

Such groups number in the dozens across Asia -- fundamentalist Buddhists, Muslims and Hindus who are adding new fuel on what are sometimes ancient ethnic conflicts. Some boast memberships that run into the hundreds of thousands, powered by zealous social media campaigns, community support programs and effective fundraising operations. The donations, often tiny amounts collected from poor followers, become a source of support for hard-line leaders.

An armored personnel carrier transports troops in the southern Philippine city of Marawi in October. Earlier that month, military forces ended a five-month siege of the city by Islamic State-linked militants. © Reuters

Analysts warn that such ethno-religious chauvinism represents the biggest threat to the economic growth the region has enjoyed in recent years -- and to the dream of greater cohesion over trade and economic issues. "Rapid economic growth over the past three decades has raised standards of living across much of Asia, but left marginal areas, like Mindanao in the Philippines and Rakhine State in Myanmar, untouched and therefore comparatively worse off," said Michael Vatikiotis, Asia director of the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue. "It is perhaps no coincidence that these areas are afflicted by violent conflict."

Vatikiotis warns that rising levels of economic inequality and bitter political divisions could fan a broader conflict in mainstream society. Unlike IS and other jihadist groups, these groups focus more on protests, propaganda and, in extreme cases, physical intimidation. Through networks of community-based leaders, they bring in funding and support from relatively moderate constituencies.

Some hard-line groups are connected to more constructive religious and community-building activities, noted Matthew J. Walton, a Myanmar specialist at Oxford University's St. Antony's College. Myanmar's Buddhist nationalist movement is made up of a complicated mix of people and groups "operating in an opaque environment that blurs religious and political motivations," Walton said.

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