Southeast Asia: News, Culture, Voices

When I spoke with Ansyaad Mbai, Indonesia’s top counter terrorism official, he pointed to the country’s Islamic boarding schools as places where the future of Indonesia’s Islam could be decided. U.S. officials have called the schools, or pesantrens, breeding grounds for terrorism. Yet, while a few of the schools have been connected to radical Islam, most provide an important system of education for the country’s poor and rural communities. 

Indonesia's top counter-terrorism official, Ansyaad Mbai, in his Jakarta office. October 2008.

I visited a number of pesantrens in West Java and spoke with students, teachers and religious leaders. Listen to the radio report, broadcast this week on WBAI’s Asia Pacific Forum (99.5 FM, New York City).

Read more about the Fahmina Institute here: http://fahmina.or.id/en/

Ustadz Wahyuddin, current director of the Pondok Ngruki school in Central Java.

YOGYAKARTA, Indonesia — Early Sunday morning, the Indonesian government executed three men convicted of the 2002 Bali Bombings, ending a controversial period of postponements, court appeals and international media attention. The three all have ties to an Islamic boarding school, called Pondok Ngruki, located in Central Java. The school is one of the most notorious in the country for espousing a fundamentalist version of Islam and for producing particularly fervent alumni. I visited the school three days before the executions took place and spoke with the current director, Ustadz Wahyuddin. 

Read the report filed for World Politics Review.