•    HOME   
•    NEWS   
•    BUSINESS   
•    INTERNATIONAL   
•    TECH   
•    SPORTS   
•    LIFE & TIMES   
•    OPINION   
•    MY JAKARTA   
•    BLOGS   

Police have stepped up their monitoring of Islamist networks, but see no indication of any security threat to US President Barack Obama’s visit next month, the head of the nation’s antiterrorism unit said.

“So far there is no indication of threats from any group against President Obama. Hopefully everything will go well,” Brig. Gen. Tito Karnavian told the Jakarta Globe, adding that security for the visit would be handled by the Armed Forces with support from the police.

“Our job description at Densus 88 is clear: to anticipate any terror threat,” he said.

Police have succeeded in killing or capturing a string of suspected militants, including Southeast Asia’s most-wanted terrorist, Noordin M Top, after suicide bombings at two luxury Jakarta hotels last July shattered a four-year lull in attacks.

Tito told Reuters that although the threat level was lower after Malaysian-born Noordin was shot dead during a police raid last September, there was still a risk of new attacks.

“Noordin Top is not the only militant cell within the [Islamist] network. He’s just one general, but there are some other generals,” said Tito, who was appointed head of the antiterror unit late last year.

Trained with Australian and US help, the unit was established after the deadly 2002 Bali bombings carried out by regional militant network Jemaah Islamiyah.

A string of other attacks in the country since 2000 have been blamed on JI, although violent splinter groups, such as the one led by Noordin, are now believed to be the key threats.

Tito said about 300 Indonesians had some form of military capability after being trained in militant camps in Afghanistan, Pakistan or the Philippines.

He said that police had been monitoring militant networks closely, but had found no indication of any plots targeting the US president’s first official visit to Indonesia from March 20 to 22.

“So far there is no news. There is no info on that,” he said.

The investigations into the attacks on the Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott hotels in Jakarta last July, which killed nine people, including the two suicide bombers, pointed to a re-establishment of ties between Al Qaeda and regional militants, Tito said.

“We don’t have very strong evidence to connect Jemaah Islamiyah, radical Islamist networks in Indonesia and Al Qaeda,” he said. “But indications are that the networks have already reconnected, yes, through the funding.”

Al Qaeda helped fund the 2002 Bali bombings and the 2003 JW Marriott bombing in Jakarta, which together killed 214 people, both Indonesian and foreign nationals, and injured hundreds more.

A hard-line Muslim group has said that although it would welcome Obama and his family to Jakarta in March, it urged him to return Riduan “Hambali” Isamuddin, a terror suspect who is currently detained in US custody at Guantanamo Bay.

“We will strongly demand Obama fulfill his promise of taking a more sympathetic approach toward the Islamic world. We will urge him to send Hambali home,” said Chep Hermawan, head of West Java’s Islamic Reform Movement (Garis).

If Obama was unable to repatriate Hambali, Garis said it would ask the US president to give his family access to visit him at Guantanamo Bay.

Garis often carries out its own raids against drinking and gambling across West Java, and works to promote the implementation of Shariah law. It is based in Hambali’s hometown of Cianjur.

The United States is considering trying Hambali in Washington for his alleged role in the 2002 Bali bombings. Indonesian police believe Hambali was also a key figure in the Christmas Eve church bombings in 2000 and the bombing of the JW Marriott in Jakarta in 2003.

Hambali was allegedly Osama bin Laden’s point man in Indonesia and, until his capture in Thailand in August 2003. He was believed to be the main link between Al Qaeda and JI.

 

Reuters, JG