Indonesian police have restarted carrying out the anti-lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) agenda of militant Islamists, Human Rights Watch (HRW) says.

The organization points to the cancelation of a public sports and cultural event involving transgender people last week after the Islamic Congregation Forum, a militant Islamist organization, complained the event violated “religious values.”

“Police added insult to injury by temporarily detaining 600 transgender and “bissu” (a gender-neutral identity in South Sulawesi’s Bugis tradition) people hours before the three-day event was scheduled to begin,” HRW says.

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The organization says the event cancelation and mass detainment is the latest in a string of incidents in which Indonesian police have “openly collaborated” with militant Islamists to unlawfully disrupt the LGBT community.

HRW has called on President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to deliver on his commitment to defend the rights of LGBT people by “making it clear to the Indonesian police they are obligated to protect the rights of all Indonesians, including the country’s LGBT population, rather than conspire with their oppressors.”

Editor: Olivia Yang