JI behind 50 bombings in RI: ICG<\/p>\n
Agence France-Presse, Jakarta<\/p>\n
The Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) has staged some 50 bombings or
\nattempted bombings in Indonesia since April 1999 including the
\nBali blast, an international research group said Wednesday.<\/p>\n
The International Crisis Group (ICG), in a report entitled
\n\"Indonesia's Terrorist Network: How Jemaah Islamiyah Works\",
\ncalls for the reopening of investigations into these blasts \"as a
\ntop priority\" and with international help if possible.<\/p>\n
It says intelligence resources must be strengthened but these
\nshould go to the police and not to the National Intelligence
\nAgency (BIN) or military intelligence.<\/p>\n
While BIN had done some important legwork on the Bali bombing,
\n\"there is too much history between some of the JI players and BIN
\nto make it an impartial participant on this one.\"<\/p>\n
ICG also says it suspects that \"someone in the armed forces\"
\nmust have known that church bombings in the city of Medan were
\nbeing planned for Christmas Eve 2000 and saw an opportunity
\nfalsely to blame them on the Free Aceh Movement (GAM).<\/p>\n
It says there is a \"curious link\" in the Medan attack between
\nAcehnese figures close to JI and military intelligence, because
\nboth bitterly oppose GAM.<\/p>\n
While military intelligence was not necessarily working with
\nJI, \"it does raise a question about the extent to which it knew
\nor could have found out more about JI than it has acknowledged.\"<\/p>\n
Bombs were delivered that Christmas Eve to 38 churches or
\npriests in 11 cities nationwide. Nineteen people were killed.<\/p>\n
The report urges authorities to \"give more attention to
\naddressing corruption in the police, army and immigration
\nservice, with a particular attention to the trade in arms and
\nexplosives.\"<\/p>\n
It says JI's spiritual leader Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, now in
\ndetention as a suspect in the Christmas Eve bombings, knows far
\nmore than he is willing to divulge about JI operations but is
\nunlikely to have masterminded attacks.<\/p>\n
ICG says a \"deep rift\" has opened between the Indonesian
\ncleric and the JI leadership in Malaysia, who find him not
\nradical enough.<\/p>\n
The report by the Brussels-based group says JI was set up by
\nIndonesians living in Malaysia in the mid-1990s and has links to
\nOsama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.<\/p>\n
It has a network of supporters across Indonesia, Malaysia,
\nSingapore and the southern Philippines and has reached out to
\nMuslim organizations in Thailand and Myanmar, ICG says.<\/p>\n
Top strategists appear to be proteges of Abdullah Sungkar, who
\nis now dead but who co-founded with Ba'asyir an Islamic boarding
\nschool in Central Java.<\/p>\n
They are mostly Indonesians living in Malaysia who are
\nveterans of Afghanistan from during or after the Soviet
\noccupation.<\/p>\n
A second tier was apparently assigned as field coordinators
\nwhile the bottom rung -- those who carried out actual attacks --
\nwere selected only shortly beforehand.<\/p>\n
The ICG says the Bali investigation has shown how JI uses
\nfamily ties, old school ties and linkages to Darul Islam (which
\nstaged an Islamic revolt in Indonesia in the 1950s) to wage holy
\nwar.<\/p>\n
\"The reach of JI through these networks may be more extensive
\nthan previously thought even though the number of senior JI
\nleaders appears to be very small.\"<\/p>\n
Before Bali, the bombings appeared to have been revenge for
\nmassacres of Muslim by Christians in the Maluku islands and the
\nPoso district of Central Sulawesi.<\/p>\n
The ICG says JI members or sympathizers ran dozens of mostly
\nsmall camps across Indonesia, some of which included foreign
\ntrainers, to teach weapons and bomb-making skills for use in
\nthese areas.<\/p>\n
But the US-led war on terror now appeared to have become the
\nmain focus. The targeting in Bali of westerners rather than
\nIndonesian Christians \"may be indicative of that shift.\"<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/ji-behind-50-bombings-in-ri-icg-1447893297",
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
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