After Bali

摘要

If the September 11th terrorist attacks last year changed the world, the October 12th bombing in Bali has certainly changed Indonesia. Before, the local authorities did not even acknowledge the existence of Jemaah Islamiah, a group accused by America and Singapore of launching various terrorist attacks, and refused to arrest the group's alleged leader, Abu Bakar Basyir. But in the two weeks since the attack, police have detained Mr Basyir (on his hospital bed), and Indonesia, among other countries, now wants the United Nations to declare Jemaah Islamiah a terrorist group. What's more, the government, which had spent months in fruitless negotiation with parliament over a counter-terrorism law, has summarily awarded police new powers to monitor, arrest and detain suspected terrorists. All this is proof, foreign observers hope, that Indonesia will now put its weight behind the efforts of other South-East Asian countries to combat terrorism. But as the experience of those other countries demonstrates, political will alone will not get the job of quashing extremism done.