Living with shariah law: Crime and punishment in Indonesia's Aceh

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Shariah policemen speak to a student who was caught playing games in an Internet cafe during school hours in Banda Aceh, in Indonesia's Aceh province. The boy was given a morality lecture and forced onto a shariah patrol truck to be taken back to school, where he faced humiliation from other students and teachers.Female members of the Wilayatul Hisbah shariah police get instructions from a commander before going on patrol in Banda Aceh.Photos and text by Damir Sagolj, Reuters — Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim nation, but nowhere is the faith more strictly interpreted than in Aceh, sometimes referred to as the "verandah of Mecca" because it was one of the first parts of the archipelago to turn to Islam.

Aceh, which was hit by a tsunami in 2004 that killed an estimated 130,000 in the province, is Indonesia's only district to have implemented shariah, or Islamic law. This is something that occurred for complicated reasons, some of which go well beyond the religion itself and have more to do with Acehnese tradition, the long struggle for independence and conflict with outside forces, Jakarta included.

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