No trace of terrorist accounts found in Indonesia, says BI
No trace of terrorist accounts found in Indonesia, says BI
Dadan Wijaksana, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The central bank has so far found no trace of accounts in
Indonesia belonging to members of a United Nations list of
suspected international terrorists, a Bank Indonesia official
said.
"According to the reports we received from banks in the
country, none of the 300 names included on the UN list has an
account in Indonesia," Yunus Husein, BI's director for legal
affairs, said on Friday.
The list of suspected terrorist organizations was sent out
globally by the UN's Security Council as part of the war on
terror following the Sept. 11 attacks on New York's World Trade
Center and Washington's Pentagon building.
The UN asked all countries to track down and freeze bank
accounts belonging to the organizations so as to deny them funds
for their activities.
There has been a great deal of pressure on Indonesia to follow
up on the UN's request, as many countries consider Indonesia to
be a safe haven for international terrorists. But Indonesia has
been seen as being reluctant to take part in the war against
terrorism, repeatedly claiming there were no terrorists in the
country.
Indonesia only admitted to the presence of terrorists in the
country after the deadly bomb attack in Bali two weeks ago, which
claimed at least 190 lives.
Asked whether the central bank had received orders from the
Attorney General's Office or the police to track down and freeze
the accounts of Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, Yunus said: "I have no
knowledge of that (the orders). So far I have not received such
orders."
The police have declared Surakarta-based Muslim cleric
Ba'asyir, who is also chairman of the Indonesian Mujahiddin
Council (MMI), a suspect in a series of bombs attacks in the
country.
Ba'asyir has been also accused by neighboring countries of
being the spiritual leader of Jamaah Islamiah (JI), the Southeast
Asian Islamic organization suspected of being the region's arm of
Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.
The government also plans to establish a money laundering
commission to boost efforts to track down funds belonging to
terrorists in the country. Yunus has been tapped to head the
commission, but his appointment was only announced after the Bali
bombing.
Yunus has been given six months to set up the commission,
called the Financial Transaction and Report Analysis Center
(PPATK), which will have the authority to analyze and investigate
suspicious transactions and to report the findings to the
authorities for further investigation.
Aside from terrorist funds, the commission also will deal with
the practice of converting money generated from corruption,
bribery, smuggling, banking-related crimes, drug-related crimes
and human trafficking into legal investments.