Churchgoers urge police to take action against attackers

Members of HKBP church in Pondok Timur, Bekasi of West Java have urged the police to take action against an attack on Sunday morning by members of the Islam Defenders Front (FPI) and the Islamic Community Forum (FUI).

“It is the police who have the authority to handle the case,” Sahara Pangaribuan, lawyer of the HKBP churchgoers, said Sunday afternoon as quoted by tempointeraktif.com.

Sahara said HKBP members had been granted a permit from local residents to conduct their prayer group, “But [the FPI and FUI] have kept coming over the past five weeks,” he added.

Sahara along with HKPB members’ representative, Pieterson Purba, reported Tahjudin, Nuh, Solihin and Bardah from the FPI and the FUI to the police for the violence and disrupting their worship.

Sahara added that HKBP had met members of the National Commission for Human Rights (Komnas HAM), National Commission for Women (Komnas Perempuan) and the House of Representatives to report the attack.

The HKBP members said they would continue to hold their weekly prayer groups despite the ongoing violence.