Residents block access to church during Sunday service

JAKARTA (Antara): Hundreds of residents of Griya Bukit Jaya housing complex in Bogor, West Java blocked access to a church when some 190 Christians began their regular Sunday service.

It was the first such incident after the revision last week of a joint ministerial decree on new houses of worship.

Religious Affairs Minister M. Maftuh Basyuni and Home Minister M. Ma'ruf signed the revised joint ministerial decree Tuesday, which replaced a controversial decree issued in 1969.

The former decree was considered highly discriminative because it required the consent of local administrations and most residents in the areas to build houses of worship.
Non-Muslim congregations complained that the decree has been used to discriminate against them. In the past two years, 23 houses of worship in West Java alone have been forcibly shut down on the grounds that the buildings lacked permits.

Antara news agency reported Sunday that the residents in the housing complex blocked access to the Pantekosta Church in Indonesia (GPDI) built in 1987, when the Sunday service was still taking place.

No further incident occurred as dozens of police guarded the church.

According to the minister, Fekky Tatulus, he built the church when the housing complex was only occupied by few residents, but the crowd argued that the construction of the church had violated West Java gubernatorial regulation issued in 1990, which was an elaboration of a joint ministerial decree issued 1969.

Minority religions are still unhappy with the new decree, saying that the decree's requirements will make it even more difficult for minorities to worship, and contend the state has no right to regulate the basic right to practice one's faith.

The decree, among other things, rules that new places of worship must have congregations of a minimum of 90 people, and receive consent of 60 people of other faiths living in the area. There also is a requirement to obtain permits from the local administration and the Communication Forum for Religious Harmony. (**)

Illegal logging threatens elephants in Indonesia

JAKARTA, March 25 (Xinhua) -- Elephants in Indonesia's Sumatra island continue to inch toward extinction as unchecked human encroachment and illegal logging have destroyed their natural habitat at an alarming rate, local media said here on Saturday.

Only about 2,000 elephants could be found in protected wilderness zones extending from the provinces of Lampung to Aceh, including the Way Kambas, Bukit Barisan Selatan, Kerinci Seblat, Bukit Tiga Puluh and Mount. Leuser national parks, according to the Jakarta Post.

About 100 elephants live in the Tesso Nillo National Park in Riau province in Sumatra island, but there are questions about how long this small population could be sustained as the forest is lost to oil palm plantations, pulp and paper companies, illegal logging and human settlements, the paper said.

Over the last 20 years, 182,140 hectares of forest have been lost in Riau province. The latest data shows the province only has 650,000 hectares forest left.

While authorities have announced a crackdown on illegal logging in the province, there has been little progress in stopping the crime, partly due to the lack of coordination between the provincial team heading the operation and local administrations, according to the paper.

Riau Governor Rusli Zainal said recently his administration was committed to fighting illegal logging, but admitted that "the lack of coordination is a constraint."

As the habitat is destroyed, the home range and food sources of elephants are reduced.

The opening of oil palm plantations in particular has led to inevitable conflicts between people and elephants, the paper added. Enditem

Muslims assault U.S. Embassy in Indonesia over prophet cartoons

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) - Hundreds of Muslims protesting caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad tried to storm the U.S. Embassy on Sunday, smashing the windows of a guard post but failing to push through the gates. Several people were injured.

Pakistani security forces, meanwhile, sealed off the capital of Islamabad to block a planned mass demonstration and fired tear gas and gunshots to chase off protesters. In Turkey, tens of thousands gathered in Istanbul chanting slogans against Denmark, Israel and the United States.

Protests over the cartoons, which first appeared in a Danish newspaper in September and have been republished in other European publications and elsewhere, have swept across the Muslim world, growing into mass outlets for rage against the West in general, and Israel and the United States in particular.

Christians also have become targets. Pakistani Muslims protesting in the southern city of Sukkur ransacked and burned a church Sunday after hearing accusations that a Christian man had burned pages of the Qur'an, Islam's holy book.

That incident came a day after Muslims protesting in the Nigerian city of Maiduguri attacked Christians and burned 15 churches in a three-hour rampage that killed at least 15 people. Some 30 other people have died during protests over the cartoons that erupted about three weeks ago.

In Jakarta, about 400 people marched to the heavily fortified U.S. mission in the centre of the city, behind a banner reading "We are ready to attack the enemies of the Prophet."

Protesters throwing stones and brandishing wooden staves tried to break through the gates. They set fire to U.S. flags and a poster of U.S. President George W. Bush and smashed the windows of a guard outpost before dispersing after a few minutes.

The U.S. Embassy called the attacks deplorable, describing them as acts of "thuggery."
A protest organizer said the West, and particularly the United States, is attacking Islam.

"They want to destroy Islam through the issue of terrorism . . . and all those things are engineered by the United States," said Maksuni, who only uses one name.

"We are fighting America fiercely this time," he said. "And we also are fighting Denmark."