Police doing utmost to catch Tansil

JAKARTA (JP): National Police Chief Lt. Gen. Dibyo Widodo said yesterday that his force is doing all it can to recapture Eddy Tansil, the convicted businessman who escaped from a Jakarta prison last month.

Dibyo told a Commission III hearing of the House of Representatives, responsible for legal affairs, that the police are also trying to trace the whereabouts of Tansil's wife and six children who fled the country at about the same time as he did.

So far, officers have only traced the recent whereabouts of two of the children, he said.

Tansil, the owner of the Golden Key business group, was serving a 20-year jail term for defrauding the state-owned Bank Pembangunan Indonesia when he escaped from the Cipinang penitentiary in early May.

Police have launched a massive manhunt that has stretched beyond national borders. Minister of Justice Oetojo Oesman has promised to recapture Tansil within three months.

Dibyo said Indonesia has secured the cooperation of fellow members of Interpol, including China, Turkey, South Africa, Hong Kong, France and Italy.

Altogether Indonesia has written to 179 countries for help, sending the mugshots and fingerprints of Tansil, his wife and children, he said.

Indonesia has also sent police officers to Malaysia, Hongkong and Singapore -- mentioned as Tansil's most likely havens.

"We are still optimistic about finding Tansil," he said.

Dibyo said if Tansil was found in a country with which Indonesia does not have an extradition treaty, the authorities in that country could at least assist in apprehending him under the mutual assistance agreement on criminal matters program.

They could, for example, deny him an entry visa and deport him on the grounds that he was traveling on a forged passport. They could then inform the Indonesian authorities of where Tansil would thence be heading.

Indonesia currently has extradition treaties only with Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines and Australia.

Dibyo said he was confident that Singapore would also cooperate given that the two countries' police forces have worked together on various occasions in the past.

He also pointed out that each year the National Police receives assistance from foreign countries in more than 100 criminal investigations under the mutual assistance program. (16)