Ba'asyir suit against police rejected

JAKARTA: The South Jakarta District Court rejected on Thursday a lawsuit filed by cleric Abu Bakar Ba'asyir against National Police over his alleged illegal arrest.

Ba'asyir filed the lawsuit against police after authorities removed him from a hospital in Surakarta, East Java, in October 2002.

Presiding Judge Asnahwati told the court on Thursday that the court had no jurisdiction to rule on a civil case.

"It is supposedly a criminal lawsuit," she said.

Ba'asyir's lawyers had said that there was no clear legal basis to arrest the leader of Jamaah Islamiyah, a regional terrorist network believed to be behind the deadly Bali bombing, after police investigators changed the charge from attempting to topple the government to attempting to kill the president.

Ba'asyir is currently being tried for document forgery and subversion at the Central Jakarta District Court. -- JP