I

ndonesia’s claims that Islam and democracy can live together in peace have been called into question by the series of violent hard-line Muslim attacks on Canadian liberal author Irshad Manji.

Eva Kusuma Sundari, a lawmaker from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), said the attacks might taint Indonesia’s image as a democratic country that promotes pluralism.

“Although I personally disagree with Manji’s views, the attacks against her because of her standpoint were unacceptable,” Eva told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.

Eva was commenting on the attack on Manji led by the Indonesian Mujahidin Council (MMI) during the launch of her book, Allah, Liberty and Love, at the Institute for Islamic and Social Studies (LKiS) Foundation in Yogyakarta on Wednesday.

Members of the MMI have defended the attack, which injured five.

Also on Wednesday, the rector of Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta cancelled a planned discussion of Manji’s book on campus for “security reasons”

Last Friday, a similar discussion at the Salihara Cultural Center in Jakarta was stopped by police responding to concerns raised by a few dozen local residents, including members of the violent, hard-line Islam Defenders Front (FPI), who were angered over Manji’s viewpoint that Islam should accept homosexuality.

Separately, Muhammad Imdadun Rahmat, the deputy-secretary-general of the nation’s largest moderate Muslim organization, Nahdlatul Ulama, said the government’s indecisiveness in tackling hard-liners would allow vigilante groups to remain “a pebble” in the national ”shoe”. “

“The MMI, for example, opposes the nation’s Pancasila ideology. However, the government’s weakness allows such groups continue to terrorize minorities in the country,” he told the Post.

Manji, who visited Jakarta and Yogyakarta in 2008, issued a statement on her current reception.

“Four years ago, I came to Indonesia and experienced a nation of tolerance, openness and pluralism. In my new book, I describe Indonesia as a model for the Muslim world. Things have changed,” she said in the statement. (JP/asa)