Police reluctant to arrest Ba'asyir

Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Despite suspected Indonesian terrorists detained in Malaysia saying that Indonesian Mujahidin Council (MMI) Chief Abu Bakar Ba'asyir once led an organization believed to have links to international terrorist networks, police here are likely to maintain their soft stance on the Muslim cleric.

"We had once questioned Ba'asyir over the issues. Should we need to question him for the sake of further investigations, we will do it," National Police Chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar said after attending a coordinating meeting on political and security affairs here on Friday.

Da'i's statement contradicted earlier statements by police that Indonesians detained in Malaysia had failed to provide solid evidence to prove that Ba'asyir was a terrorist leader as suspected by Malaysia and Singapore.

He said the police team sent to Malaysia to interview the four detained Indonesians found out that Ba'asyir was supposed "to replace the leader of a Malaysian-based organization linked to international terrorists after the latter passed away."

"The four Indonesians detained in Malaysia admitted to us (the police team) that they knew both Ba'asyir and Hambali. From them, we also learned that Ba'asyir was slated to replace a charismatic Malaysian as leader of an organization there," Da'i continued.

He refused to say if the Malaysian-based organization was Kumpulan Militan Malaysia (KMM), but said the organization Ba'asyir was supposed to head had been active in Malaysia only.

According to Da'i, the four Indonesians also admitted that they were once under the supervision of Hambali, who has been on the police's wanted list for his alleged involvement in bomb attacks on a number of churches in Jakarta in December, 2000.

The international community has long criticized Indonesia for its reluctance to take stern action against hardline groups here even though many countries, including Singapore, Malaysia and the U.S., have delivered intelligent evidence that some of these groups have been infiltrated by international terrorist network al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda is led by Osama bin Laden, the prime suspect in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center in the U.S.

Police authorities have already questioned Ba'asyir on suspicion that his organization, MMI, which is based in Surakarta, Central Java, was linked to al-Qaeda. No evidence sufficient to detain him was found.

Malaysia and Singapore have labeled Ba'asyir a terrorist leader after the countries' police arrested tens of Indonesian terrorist suspects belonging to hardline groups Jemaah Islamiyah and KMM.

Earlier, the police sent a team led by the Police detectives' chief. Insp. Gen. Engkesman Hilep which managed to interview several Indonesians detained in Malaysia. The team, however, failed to meet any Jemaah Islamiyah members in Singapore due to technical matters.

Police later on said that "both Ba'asyir and his organization have no link to Al Qaeda."