Chris McCall, Jakarta – Church investigators have detailed a catalogue of horrors perpetrated on Christians by Islamic militias in the Maluku Islands.

Hundreds of circumcisions were carried out with a single razor blade, they said, causing heavy bleeding and infection. Some women were subject to genital mutilation. Victims were sent into the sea for "disinfection".

The investigators accused jihadis (holy warriors) of using lies and intimidation to prevent their captives from leaving on rescue ships after they were forced to change their religion.

Catholic investigator Father Agus Laritembun described the circumstances in which the Christians had "chosen" to convert. They lived, he said, under permanent threat of slaughter. Their villages were looted and razed, their crops and fruit trees destroyed.

"The choice to become Muslim under such circumstances cannot be called 'free'," he said in the report, released by the Catholic diocese of Amboina.

The evidence was gleaned from witness testimony after the third of three rescue missions finally succeeded in bringing 172 people out of Kesui and Teor islands, to the southeast of the large island of Seram. Among them were seven Muslims.

Some 2,000 to 3,000 assailants first attacked Kesui, burning a different village every day and killing at least nine residents, the report said.

Many Christians fled the island, but others took to the woods. These were later approached by local Muslims, who took them to mosques. There they were told: "By order of the Jihad, now you have come down from the woods you have to embrace Islam. If you are not willing to do so, we have to separate you from the others and you will be killed."

Two Protestant teachers, named as E. Rumatora and David Balubun, were abducted and murdered for refusing to convert, the report said. Attacks on Teor to the southeast followed. Former Christians were seen among the attackers there.

A first attempt to rescue the "converts" in early December was rebuffed by militiamen on the grounds that no one wanted to leave. "This was [obviously] a lie," the report said. A second attempt also failed.

The make-up of the rescue team was overwhelmingly Muslim, with only two Christian representatives. Questioning was carried out within earshot of Muslims. Although the interviewees said they did not want to leave, they were frightened.

A third attempt, with a more balanced team and choosing a neutral location, was partly successful but was also marred by intimidation.

Indonesian security forces did little to prevent Muslims entering the boat along with the forced converts, while women and children were kept onshore while men came on board.

"Immediately after their coming on board, turmoil erupted on the shore," the report said. Fearing for the lives of their family members that had been left behind, they chose to get off the ship again immediately."