Indonesian jailed over Facebook comment Human rights campaigners have condemned a 30-month jail sentence handed down to an Indonesian civil servant for his postings on a Facebook group for atheists. Activists warned of a worrying rise in religious intolerance in the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation. Alexander Aan, 30, was found guilty on Thursday in a West Sumatra court of "spreading information inciting religious hatred" after declaring his atheism online and posting links to explicit cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed. The judge also fined him 100m rupiah ($10,600), saying he had "caused anxiety to the community and tarnished Islam." Mr Aan was arrested by police in January after an angry crowd gathered at the civil servant's office and tried to attack him after learning of his posts on Facebook, the social networking website. World leaders such as Barack Obama, the US president, and David Cameron, the British prime minister, have singled out Indonesia as a model of the compatibility of Islam, democracy and modernity. But human rights activists said Mr Aan's conviction was the latest example of growing intolerance in this country of 240m people, where 90 per cent are Muslims. "This is worrying as part of a wider attack on freedom of religion in Indonesia," said Andreas Harsono, a Jakarta-based researcher for Human Rights Watch, an international campaign group. There is a big battle for the future of Indonesia and the extremists are getting stronger. Amnesty International, another campaign group, said Mr Aan's conviction was a "serious setback for freedom of expression in Indonesia" and a violation of Indonesia's commitments under international human rights conventions. Deddi Alfaresi, Mr Aan's defence lawyer, said his client was "very disappointed" with the verdict, which he described as "not fair." The lawyer said Mr Aan would be appealing against the verdict. "He had no intention of deliberately spreading information inciting religious hatred, he was just in a period of religious confusion at that time," Mr Alfaresi said. Minority religious groups including Christians and Muslim sects such as the Ahmadiyah have come under violent attack from extremists. Hundreds of places of worship including churches and Ahmadiyah mosques have been closed down by mobs or local officials, sometimes in violation of national laws guaranteeing freedom of religion. While the vast majority of Indonesian Muslims practise a moderate form of the faith, senior leaders including the president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, have been reluctant to speak out against the rising intolerance for fear of being accused of being "un-Islamic," campaigners said. This appears to have emboldened hardline groups such as the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), which this month forced the cancellation of a Jakarta concert by Lady Gaga, the US pop singer, after it threatened to disrupt the sold-out event. The FPI last month closed down a book launch by Irshad Manji, a liberal Canadian Muslim author. This week it put pressure on one of the country's major publishing houses, persuading it to hold a book-burning ceremony to destroy the Indonesian translation of an American theological work that it said "defamed" Islam.