The Jakarta Post | Wed, 05/23/2012 7:54 AM

The trouble with Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa is that he has probably spent too much of time travelling abroad to really understand what’s going on in his own country. On Monday he said the government has done enough to protect the interests of Indonesia’s religious minorities.

On the eve of a periodic review of Indonesia’s human rights record before the UN Human Rights Council, Marty toed the official line, saying the government has done whatever was necessary to protect the followers of Ahmadiyah by citing a number of laws and regulations enacted in the name of religious harmony.

Here is a piece of news most of us are already aware of: The country’s laws and regulations mean nothing when it comes to protecting freedom of religion. They did not protect the Ahmadis scattered across the country from being attacked and even killed by radical groups who dislike their presence. They failed to protect the followers of the GKI Yasmin Christian Church in Bogor or the Filadelfia HKBP Church in Bekasi from attacks even when the courts clearly ruled in their favor.

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But the attacks on Ahmadis and the Shiites have the official blessing, if not approval, of Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali. In the case of the GKI Yasmin and Filadelfia HKBP churches, the mayors in Bogor and Bekasi chose to turn a blind eye and even refused to uphold the court ruling.

And where were the police in all this? They were dismally absent.

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