| Home > South-East Asia >> Aceh | |
Aceh's sharia law: raped and beaten, then formally whipped
Melbourne Age - January 9, 2015
Friday's Islamic prayers had just finished, and her husband, "Naseer"* was to be punished as well. He was flogged first. But as the masked enforcer beat the man's back with a long rattan switch, once, then again – nine times in total, to the gasps of the assembled crowd – Yasmeen passed out.
"She felt humiliated," says an intermediary, who does not want her real name used either. "She was on stage for a few minutes and then she fainted. They had to take her off and wait until she was conscious."
Aceh is the only province in Indonesia that uses Islamic sharia law to punish offences against religion. After some discussion, the sharia authorities agreed to delay Yasmeen's whipping until after she had her baby. She is due to give birth in July and the punishment hangs like terror over her.
Yasmeen is 25. Her "crime" was to be found by a mob of her neighbours alone (but fully clothed) in her own house with Naseer – a man she was not married to at the time. For that, which under Aceh's sharia law is considered khalwat, or indecency, both were sentenced to the maximum penalty of nine strokes of the cane.
But even before the flogging, both have already paid richly in pain and humiliation.
According to Ibrahim Latif, the chief of sharia police, on May 1 last year, a group of 10 villagers near the rural Acehnese town of Langsa were watching Yasmeen's house at 1am when the couple came home together. After the pair went inside, eight people – seven men and one 13-year-old boy – broke in. They found Naseer in his underwear, Yasmeen fully dressed.
They tied Naseer up with cloth and took Yasmeen into another room and stripped her naked. Then seven men took turns to rape her. The boy said later he was innocent because he had only touched her a little. Naseer, they beat.
When they had finished, the mob, in Latif's words, "paraded [them] around the town". One stop was a local fish pond where they scooped up the filthy water and poured it over the traumatised couple.
At 5am, four hours after the attack began, the men took the pair to the village head and reported their alleged indecency. He rang Latif, the enforcer of sharia law.
In Latif's office, it became clear that while the couple may have breached sharia law, the mob had breached the criminal law against rape. Latif called the police, who began an investigation.
Eight months later, three of the mob have been dealt with under civilian law for the gang rape, including the boy. He was released because he was underage and proclaimed his innocence. Two men were sentenced to three years in jail – they're likely to spend less than two.
The other five men, according to police, are "still on the run". Even though this is a tight-knit semi-rural community, apparently the police have been unable for eight months to locate them.
"Everything is being done in accordance to regulations," Langsa police chief Hariadi assured Fairfax Media. Not everyone agrees.
"Police should really put more effort into finding them," says the intermediary. She is trying to advocate for her friend in an environment hostile to anybody questioning how sharia law is implemented in Aceh.
Yasmeen and Naseer, meanwhile, have married. The baby she's carrying is his. Out of fear of further reprisal, they declined an interview, but they did pass on a question: why is sharia law still intent on giving Yasmeen the maximum possible punishment for khalwat, but has nothing to say about the adultery involved in the multiple rape?
"At the moment the way the sharia law is implemented in Aceh, it's only subjecting women [to punishment]," says the friend. "[Yasmeen] says the rape perpetrators should've received both punishments, from the sharia and the criminal law."
Sharia policeman Latif defends his approach. Adultery and rape did not become crimes under sharia until late in 2014, after this offence took place, he says. Under the new law, which will be implemented this year, adultery (along with homosexuality) is subject to 100 lashes, and rape to 150.
"Many say whipping is against a person's human rights, but our punishment stops there. Ordinary criminal law can send people to prison for years," Latif says. "That is more inhumane – preventing a person from seeing his family, stopping his ability to work and support his family."
In the Islamic media, Latif was even more forthright. He told hardline website Hidayatullah.com that Western journalists had been unfair to confuse the indecency and the rape charges.
A spokesman for the hardline Islamic Defenders Front said the media had a "hidden agenda" to give a bad impression of Islamic sharia.
As for Yasmeen, she'll be flogged some time after she's had the baby. "As soon as her condition allows the whipping, in the opinion of a doctor, we will continue with the punishment," Latif said. "Nine lashes. We will do it."
(*) Not their real names
See also:
 |