Jakarta – Muslim youth leaders on Friday joined a plea by lawyers and rights advocates for police to stop allowing violent vigilante raids on Indonesian nightspots in the name of Islam go unpunished.

"Violence, in any name, is nothing but intentional destruction," Imam Addaruqudni, head of the 30-million strong Muhammadiyah youth wing, told a joint media conference here.

The heads of Ansor, the youth section of the 40-million-member Nahdlatul Ulama organisation and the Indonesian Islamic Students Union joined Addaruqudni and the head of Muhammadiyah's Adolescent Corps in condemning the groups' actions.

Since early this year, gangs of young Muslim men, some from the Islamic Defenders' Front (FPI), have been raiding nightclubs and bars in and around Jakarta, beating up patrons, smashing beer signs, and attacking women they accuse of prostitution.

In recent months the attacks have spread to other towns in Java, including the sleepy city of Solo, and included robbery of patrons' wallets and mobile phones.

"These actions can in no way be tolerated and amount to criminal deeds, even though they are camouflaged with religious attributes and symbols," the Muslim youth leaders said in a joint statement with lawyers and rights advocates.

Police have taken little action, apart from reportedly shooting at the wheels of a truck carrying FPI members, and a public condmnation issued last week by the national police spokesman, Brigadier General Saleh Saaf.

"The police have not taken any firm action," Hendardi, a leading human rights lawyer, said. "This is resulting in suspicion among the people that maybe police and the military are behind it and directing it."

Hendardi said the national chief of police should be sacked if officers could not carry out their law-enforcement functions. He said the raids, which he described as vandalism, had been going unpunished all year long. "If police keep allowing vandalism, it's just the same as allowing human rights violations."

Imam Addaruqudni said the attacks, even in the name of religion, were "a violation of property rights, and amount to personal attacks."

In their joint statement, the Muslim leaders, Hendardi and other lawyers warned that allowing the vandalism would lead to wider conflicts. "Police must make serious efforts to prevent all possibilities which could lead to inter-communal conflict," the statement read. It's important to remember that the deadly Muslim-Christian conflict in Indonesia's Maluku islands had resulted from, among other factors, the failure of police to deal with provocative actions."