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RI, Australia to open antiterror center

Agencies Denpasar, Bali

Australia and Indonesia announced on Thursday the planned establishment of an antiterror center in an effort to fight groups like the al-Qaeda-linked Jamaah Islamiyah.

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said his country would give A$38.3 million (US$29.5 million) to the Indonesia Center for Law Enforcement Cooperation.

"We'll be putting A$38.3 million over five years into that center," he was quoted by AFP as saying on the sidelines of a regional counterterrorism conference on the resort island of Bali.

Downer said Australia was seeking donations from other countries for the center that would provide information and training for cash-strapped governments fighting terror groups.

An Indonesian figure would head the staff of the center that will include 20 Australians, most of them federal police officers, and will be based in Jakarta, he said.

"Its task will not only be to help ourselves (Australia and Indonesia) with training, but also others in the region who want to take advantage of this resource," he said as quoted by AP.

The center is expected to be operational by the end of 2004, Downer said, while the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Marty Natalegawa talked of an earlier start date.

"We are talking more of weeks, rather than months, I think. At least the embryo of the thing," he told AFP.

Downer said the center would not only be helping with the investigation of Jamaah Islamiyah, but also its links with al- Qaeda and other terrorist organizations like the Abu Sayyaf group in the Philippines.

The center is expected to offer training in forensics, bomb disposal and other antiterror techniques, and to provide an information clearinghouse.