By NNN-ANTARA,
Jakarta : About 1,000 Indonesian Muslims demonstrated outside the presidential palace here Sunday demanding Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono issue a decree disbanding a “deviant” Islamic group.
The fringe Ahmadiyah group, which has several thousand members in Indonesia, was declared “deviant” in January by the Indonesian Council of Ulemas (MUI), Indonesia’s highest Islamic authority.
A government team last week also recommended Ahmadiyah be disbanded because of its teachings — it believes Mohammed was not the final prophet, contradicting a central tenet of mainstream Islam.
“We call on President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to immediately issue a presidential decree disbanding the Ahmadiyah organisation, confiscate its assets and demand its members and followers to disband and return to the true teachings of Islam,” a statement distributed by the protesters in front of the Merdeka Palace said.
The protesters, from the Muslim Forum (FUI), which gathers scores of mostly hardline Muslim organisations, came to the palace on foot from the nearby Istiqlal mosque where they had gathered since early in the morning.
“Disband Ahmadiyah, oust America” the protesters chanted without explaining the links between the two.
The demonstrators, mostly men clad in white, also carried flags and posters demanding Ahmadiyah be disbanded.