Police nab illegal loggers
Eva C. Komandjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Papua Police have captured three suspects along with a barge full of smuggled timber in the Naramasa waters near Manokwari, the National Police say.
A police spokesman, Sr. Comr. Zainuri Lubis, said on Monday the seizure took place late last month, but was reported by Papuan Police chief Insp. Gen. Dody Sumantiawan only recently.
He did not give a reason why the case had not been made public earlier.
"The Papuan Police intercepted the boat, bearing the name SMB3, in Naramasa waters on Jan. 27. The barge was found laden with 639 logs of Merbau wood, a total volume of about 2,123 cubic meters," Lubis said.
He said that the barge, towed by a tugboat, was on its way to Gresik, near the East Java capital of Surabaya, to meet the buyers.
"The police found no any documents whatsoever aboard the vessel, that is why the Papuan police decided to confiscate the timber and detained the ship along with its captain," Lubis said.
Police have named three suspects in this case, one a Malaysian national, Tan Thian Seng, who is allegedly financing the massive illegal logging operation. The other two -- identified as Stevanus Sobat and Alexander Lois Windesi -- are Indonesian citizens who are accused of running the smuggling venture.
The three were arrested on Feb. 3 in Manokwari.
The owner of the tugboat, Efendi Maksud, and two alleged buyers, Kuriasin Kacong and David Rekideso, along with eight other people aboard the tug, were still being questioned by police, he said.
However, Lubis said he had no evidence the suspects were connected with the huge smuggling racket recently exposed by environmental investigators. Evidence by two non-governmental organizations -- the British-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) and the Indonesian environmental group Telapak -- say Malaysian businessmen along with Chinese and Hong Kong companies cooperate with the Indonesian Military and government officials to regularly ship 300,000 cubic meters of Merbau timber a month to China.
"We're still investigating whether Tan is related to the (activist-exposed) smuggling ring. Most of the suspects in many recent cases have been Malaysian citizens," Lubis said.
Lubis said he was sure police or the military were not involved in this case.
Merbau timber is one of the most valuable species in Southeast Asia, but Papuan communities get only about US$10 a cubic meter for chopping the trees down. It is sold for around $270 a cubic meter in China, where it is used for furniture and flooring.
"We don't know whether the police and the military are involved in other cases, but they are certainly not in this case. We have to look at one case at a time to find out," Lubis said.