Police step up manhunt for Noordin

Police step up manhunt for Noordin

The Jakarta Post, Malang/Semarang/Jakarta

Thousands of security officers have been knocking on doors and
combing railway and bus stations in the hunt for terrorist
Noordin M. Top and his associates following the death of Azahari
bin Husin.

The search was stepped up on Friday as the discovery of 30
bombs in a police raid on Azahari's hideout on Wednesday
suggested the group is planning attacks.

National Police chief of detectives Comr. Gen. Makbul
Padmanegara said that documents and other material stored on
computer discs found at the hideout in the East Java resort town
of Batu were being used to track Noordin down.

"We continue the manhunt for Azahari's terror network based on
the data we gathered (in Batu). The police hope and pray to
succeed," Makbul said in Batu.

He claimed some new leads had stemmed from the investigation
in Batu, a sleepy town some 800 kilometers east of Jakarta.

Four forensic experts from Australia were seen working with
local police officers checking documents and taking pictures of
other evidence that could lead to the capture of Noordin and
other members of the terror group.

Azahari and Noordin, both Malaysian nationals, have been
blamed for a string of bombings in the country. The two were seen
as key figures of Jamaah Islamiyah, a shadowy regional terror
network linked to al-Qaeda, which aims to create Islamic states
in the Southeast Asia region. Azahari, a skilled bombmaker, was
killed during the raid by the police's antiterror unit Detachment
88 in Batu on Wednesday. Noordin, a strategist responsible for
recruiting local operatives, was nearly caught in Semarang,
Central Java, on Wednesday when the police followed one of
Azahari's messengers to Noordin's hiding place. During the
operation on Wednesday -- both in Batu and Semarang -- the police
arrested four operatives.

Thousands of police fanned out across Java island on Friday
looking for Noordin. According to Antara, the police
tightened security at the port in Banten to prevent terrorists
from crossing by ferry to Sumatra. The police had also deployed
sharpshooters and sniffer dogs to the area.

In Central Java, Detachment 88 officers raided a house in
Kaliwungu, Kendal, in the search for Noordin. The police found 40
live bullets for a M-16 machine gun and books on Islam in the
small house, belonging to Muslim cleric Subur Sugiarto, who was
not at home during the raid.

According to neighbors, the Subur family had left the house
for an unspecified location before Idul Fitri.

In Semarang, two plainclothes policemen raided a cellular
phone shop belonging to Anif Solchanudin, who was arrested on
Wednesday on account of one of Noordin's men staying at his house
for the two days after Idul Fitri last week.

Elsewhere, Makbul said on Friday that the police had found
more evidence at the Batu site that Azahari was linked to the
Oct. 1 suicide bomb attacks on Bali, which killed 23 people
including three suicide bombers.

In a related development, the police said on Friday that they
had found a video message from the three Bali suicide bombers
defending their attacks and saying they would go to heaven.

The video, which has not been publicly released, was found at
the hideout of Noordin in Semarang on Wednesday after the arrest
of an alleged accomplice, police said.

"The video contains the confession of the three suicide
bombers explaining why they were prepared to carry out the
suicide bombings," National Police chief General Sutanto said.

"They said their action was for a noble cause and they would
go to heaven," Sutanto told a press conference after a Cabinet
meeting.