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Exclusive: Indonesia's reputation as a model of moderate Islam intact - president


>Indonesia's president said on Monday his country remains a model of moderate Islam, countering critics who point to mass rallies by radical Muslims and the jailing of a Christian politician for blasphemy as evidence its reputation is crumbling.

>"Pluralism has always been a part of Indonesia's DNA," Joko Widodo told Reuters in an interview at the presidential palace in Jakarta. "Despite many challenges, Islam in Indonesia has always been a force for moderation."

>Indonesia's state ideology includes national unity, social justice and democracy alongside belief in God, and enshrines religious diversity in a secular system of government.

>Hardline Islamist groups were banned under the authoritarian regime of President Suharto, which ended in 1998, but they have gained ground in recent years, emerging from the fringes of society in the world's biggest Muslim-majority country.

>Religious and political tensions spiraled at the end of last year when Islamists led protests by hundreds of thousands in Jakarta against the capital's then governor, an ethnic-Chinese Christian who was charged with insulting the Koran.

>Governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, an ally of President Widodo, lost his bid for re-election to a Muslim rival in April after months of agitation against him by a radical group, the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI).

>In May he was sentenced to two years in jail for blasphemy.

>Widodo said Indonesia was "still a model" of pluralism and noted comments on Saturday by former U.S. President Barack Obama - on a personal visit to the country where he spent some of his childhood - that its history of tolerance must be preserved.