Police capture alleged JI operations chief

Police capture alleged JI operations chief

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta/Denpasar

In what is being hailed as a major breakthrough, police
investigating the deadly Bali bombings arrested on Tuesday night
Mukhlas, alias Ali Gufron, the alleged chief of regional terror
network Jamaah Islamiyah (JI).

National Police Detective Chief Insp. Gen. Erwin Mappaseng
told journalists on Wednesday that police arrested nine people,
including Mukhlas and his wife Khodijah, in the Central Java town
of Klaten on Tuesday.

"We have managed to arrest several people, including the
person wanted by Indonesian, Malaysian and Singaporean police. He
is Mukhlas or Ali Ghufron," Erwin said.

The seven others were named as Hermiyanto, Najib Nawir, Rahmat
Yusuf, Muhammad Nuri, Wahyuningsih, Lili Mustofa and Said
Sungkar.

Police seized a pistol and 12 bullets during Mukhlas's arrest.

Mukhlas is the elder brother of Amrozi, 40, one of the key
suspects in the Oct. 12 Bali attack. Amrozi is being held at Bali
Police Headquarters.

Erwin said Mukhlas was likely involved in the Bali attack, but
he did not elaborate.

The Oct. 12 bombing left more than 190 people dead and more
than 300, mainly foreign tourists, injured.

Speaking about other arrested suspects, Erwin said Hermiyanto
helped Samudra and another suspect Dulmatin, a bomb maker who is
still at large, rent a house in Central Java.

Wahyuningsih, meanwhile, is the wife of another Bali bomb
suspect Umar alias Patek, Erwin said.

The capture of Mukhlas and his accomplices marked another
success of the multinational joint investigation team, after the
earlier arrests of Amrozi and the alleged mastermind of the
blasts, Imam Samudra.

Mukhlas is believed to have replaced Hambali as JI's
operations chief in Southeast Asia. Hambali, an Indonesian whose
birth name is Riduan Isamuddin, is believed to be a senior al-
Qaeda operative. He is being hunted by Indonesia and a number of
other countries for terrorism charges.

National Police said earlier that Hambali was thought to have
fled the region after the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States
and may have gone to Pakistan.

Several foreign leaders and media have accused JI of being
involved in the Bali blasts even though Amrozi and Samudra have
denied connections with the organization, which the United
Nations recently put on its list of banned terrorist groups.

Samudra, according to his lawyers, has insisted that he was
the mastermind of the Bali bombings although he had discussed the
plans with Hambali to bomb the resort island.

Brig. Gen. Edward Aritonang, spokesman of the team
investigating the Bali blasts, said on Wednesday that Samudra
would be flown from Jakarta to Bali on Thursday for further
questioning "if everything goes as planned".

"He will be taken on a commercial plane, so we will have to
provide extra security for the flight," he told a teleconference
with journalists in the Bali capital of Denpasar.

Samudra was captured at the Merak ferry port in Banten on Nov.
21, and is being detained in Jakarta for interrogations over his
involvement in previous bombings across Indonesia.

The police have appeared to focus their investigation on the
roles of Samudra, Amrozi and their accomplices in the bomb
blasts, but have neglected other possible explanations such as
solving the mystery behind the explosives used in the bombing,
including RDX found at the bomb site.

So far, the police have not explained the sources of these
explosives. Samudra and Amrozi have denied any knowledge of RDX,
allegedly saying they used TNT and other chemicals to make the
bombs.