JI gets timely leadership boost with bomber's escape

JI gets timely leadership boost with bomber's escape

P. Parameswaran
Agence France-Presse
Manila

With its spiritual head in the dock and operational chief on the
run, Southeast Asia's Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) terror group has
received a timely leadership boost through the escape of its
strategist from a Philippine jail, analysts say.

Indonesian Fathur Rohman Al-Ghozi, JI's best trained bomb
expert, bolted from a high-security jail last Monday while
serving a 17-year term for possession of a ton of explosives he
planned to use for bombing Western targets in Singapore.

Following his escape, the 31-year-old Al-Ghozi is expected to
shuttle among the Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand
-- his former haunts -- to help reorganize JI's hit squads and
activate sleeper cells in Southeast Asia, intelligence officials
in the region told AFP.

"If you look at it from the leadership angle and his
organizing capabilities, Al-Ghozi's escape is a much-needed
morale booster for JI, especially at this critical juncture when
they are feeling the heat from relentless counter-terrorism
campaigns," an official said.

Al-Ghozi has admitted being a bombmaker for the JI, believed
to be the Southeast Asian chapter of the al-Qaeda network of
Osama bin Laden.

JI has been using violent means in its bid to establish a pan-
Islamic state across the region.

Indonesian Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, 64, the alleged
spiritual head of the JI who is charged with trying to topple the
Indonesian government through terrorism, is in detention in
Jakarta and facing treason charges.

Another Indonesian, Hambali, the JI operational chief and
Asia's most wanted man, is believed to be hiding in Thailand,
intelligence officials say.

Hambali, also known as Riduan Isamuddin, played a key role in
directing the Bali bomb attack that killed more than 200 people
in October last year.

With Ba'asyir incarcerated and Hambali on the run, Al-Ghozi
should be able to reestablish contacts with the JI network
quickly and shepherd its operations, analysts said.

"Al-Ghozi is a senior figure in the JI and considering his
operational expertise, this is going to be very problematic" for
counterrorism, said Andrew Tan, a security analyst at the
Singapore-based Institute of Defense and Strategic Studies.

"Even before his escape, JI's network remained active," Tan
said, citing the arrest this month of nine JI suspects in
Indonesia who police said were planning assassinations and
bombings.

Police had seized from them explosives, detonators,
ammunition, rifles, binoculars, JI documents and a booklet of
church service schedules.

"With Al-Ghozi now at large, together with other senior JI
members such as Hambali, the potential for fresh attacks around
the region remains," said Bruce Gale, a political risk analyst
with Hill and Associates Risk Consultancy (S) Pte. Ltd.

Although JI activities are traditionally confined to Malaysia,
Indonesia, southern Thailand and southern Philippines, Gale said
the pattern of arrests in more recent times suggested it "may now
be trying to form alliances with other militant groups in the
Indochina region, and possibly even Bangladesh."

Security analyst Tan said only 140 of the more than 500 JI
members who trained in terrorism in Afghanistan and Southeast
Asian camps, notably in the Philippines and Indonesia, had been
arrested.

"Even their second- and third-ranking operatives can plan bomb
attacks autonomously," he added.

Another key JI operative still in hiding is Azahari Mohamed,
the bomb maker for the Bali blasts.

An analyst, who declined to be named, said Al-Ghozi and
Hambali made a "deadly combination" and could revive plans to
bomb targets in Singapore and Indonesia.

Rohan Gunaratna, author of Inside Al-Qaeda: Global Network of
Terror, said Al-Ghozi was capable of swiftly launching terrorist
attacks.

"He is the most experienced, the best trained and the most
well motivated," Gunaratna said.

"He is the one man who can put together an operation in such a
short time. He knows how to purchase weapons, he knows how to put
operations together, he knows security."

An intelligence official said Al-Ghozi, who received training
from the al-Qaeda in then Taliban-ruled Afghanistan before the
U.S.-led war toppled the hardline Islamic regime in 2001, could
fit into Ba'asyir's shoes although he was about half his age.

"He is disciplined, intelligent and very religious and when
you talk to him, he is calm and respectful," said the official,
among those who had interviewed al-Ghozi before his escape.

Al-Ghozi was convicted last year after confessing to using
part of a huge cache to blow up a Manila train and other targets
in December 2000, killing 22 people.

He said he planned to ship the rest to Singapore as part of a
JI plot to blow up Western embassies there.

Al-Ghozi has also been implicated in the bombing of the
Philippine ambassador's Jakarta residence and two churches in the
capital in 2000.