President Jokowi Talks About the Success of Deradicalization Program in Indonesia

President Jokowi has a conversation with the Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau at the G-20 Forum1

At Session I of Leader’s Retreat of the G-20 Summit in Hamburg, Germany, Friday (7/7) afternoon local time, President Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo also explained about the success of Indonesa in handling terrorism issues through deradicalization program.

With this program, the President said that only 3 out of 560 ex-terrorists, or only 0.53 percent, still have an intention to carry out acts of terrorism. The Government of Indonesia, the President added, have also recruited influencing social media users to spread peace messages.

“Two biggest Islamic organizations in Indonesia, i.e. Muhammadiyah and Nahdlatul Ulama also have important roles to spread peace and tolerant Islamic teachings,” the President said.

The President also stated that Indonesia is a diverse country with the largest Muslim population in the world. Indonesia is also the third biggest democratic country in the world.

With these unique and strategic positions, Indonesia is committed to be part of global efforts to counter terrorism as well as to spread the values of peace and tolerance.

On that occasion, the President also mentioned about Marawi issue, a citiy in the Philippines that at the moment is controlled by ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria). Because of this, the people of Marawi should be evacuated to other cities. “Marawi issue is a call for us that the network of ISIS has spreading and affiliating with local terrorists,” President Jokowi said.

To find solutions over this problem, the President said that Indonesia has initiated a trilateral negotiation between Indonesia-Malaysia-the Philippines. “In the future, we will also cooperate with Australia to counter terrorism in our region,” the President further said.

On that session, the President was accompanied by Minister of Foreign Affairs Retno Marsudi, Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani, Cabinet Secretary Pramono Anung, and Head of Investment Coordinating Board Thomas Lembong. (EN/AS/ES)(MMB/YM/Naster)