Militants jailed for assembling bombs

Theresia Sufa, The Jakarta Post, Bogor

The Cibinong District Court sentenced on Tuesday four members of the Oman Rahman religious community to jail term ranging between three years and five years for assembling and storing bombs at a house in Cimanggis, Depok municipality.

Presiding judge Marsudin Nainggolan gave Agus Kusdiyanto five years in jail, while Muhamad Ferdiansyah Putra Musahid and Hadi Swandono got four years each.

"The defendants have been found guilty beyond reasonable doubt of conspiring to assemble the bombs that exploded in the house where they were being stored on March 21, 2004," the judge told the court.

The sentence was more lenient than the eight years' jail term sought earlier by the prosecution.

In a separate trial, presiding judge Edison Muhamad handed down a sentence of three years to Samin alias Apip Saan, who the court found guilty of finding a location for the staging of combat and bomb-making training for the members of the religious community.

"A compounding factor is that the defendant has brought Islam into disrepute by combining religious and criminal activities."

The same court postponed on Monday the handing down of its verdict in the trial of Omar, a Muslim preacher.

His lawyer said the defendant knew nothing about the training materials, which he said had been prepared by Harun, who is still at large.