RI assured access to question Hambali

Rita A. Widiadana, The Jakarta Post, Washington, D.C

The United States is guaranteeing that it will give Indonesia access to Hambali, alias Riduan Isamuddin, after it obtains as much information from one of the world's top terror suspects in a bid to break up the world terrorist network, a top Pentagon official says.

Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz told a group of Indonesian journalists visiting Washington on Wednesday the alleged top leader of al-Qaeda-linked Jamaah Islamiyah terror group was being questioned by professionals who had a lot of worldwide experience in dealing with terrorism.

"I know they (investigators) are in communication with Indonesian law enforcement authorities. They certainly want to get help and information from Indonesia," said Wolfowitz, a former U.S. ambassador to Indonesia.

He said the U.S. investigators fully understood the desire of Indonesia to have access to Hambali, a native of West Java, who was captured near Bangkok by U.S. and Thai authorities last month.

He reiterated that the interrogators wanted to bring him to justice, but the first requirement was to try to get as much information as possible to prevent more of his ilk from operating.

Hambali, who has been wanted for his alleged involvement in a string of bomb attacks in Indonesia between 2000 and 2003, was captured in Thailand in mid-August, less than two weeks after the JW Marriott Hotel bombing in Jakarta. He was picked up by the U.S. authorities and flown to an undisclosed site for questioning.

Indonesia has requested access to Hambali and eventually his transfer home for trial.

In a special interview with Indonesian journalists including The Jakarta Post a day before the 2nd anniversary of the Sept. 11 World Trade Center tragedy in his Pentagon office near Washington, D.C. Wolfowitz said cooperation between the U.S. and Indonesia, since the Bali bombings last October, had been extensive.

He praised Indonesia for its effectiveness in dealing with terrorism, particularly the way Jakarta discovered the alleged perpetrators of the terror attacks at home and took legal moves against them.

"It was an unfortunate case that we did not consider terrorism as a serious matter before the 9/11. The 9/11 debacle was the wake-up call to the United States, and I guess that the Bali bombing was a wake-up call to the Indonesian government and the Indonesian people," he said.

In particular, Wolfowitz expressed his respect of Insp. Gen. I Made Mangku Pastika, who led the investigation into the Bali bombings. Pastika now heads the Bali Police.

"But more broadly, there is extensive cooperation between the U.S. and Indonesia and other Southeast Asian countries to disclose terrorism activities in the region.

"We haven't stopped them obviously, but we are winning, they are losing," he said.

In regard to military involvement and assistance in counterterrorism actions, he said that the U.S. Defense Department as well as some elements in the government would like to strengthen its relationship with the Indonesian Military (TNI), most of which was cut off after allegations of TNI involvement in the East Timor atrocities in 1999.

In Jakarta, National Police Chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar said the police could not use the interrogation document on Hambali, provided by the U.S. authorities, as legal evidence as Indonesian law does not recognize it.

"It can only serve as an intelligence document. That is why we need to meet directly with Hambali," Da'i said on the sidelines of a Cabinet meeting on Thursday.

From Manila, the Indonesian Police detective directorate chief Comr. Gen. Erwin Mappaseng said Hambali organized all the bombings in Indonesia.

"The bombings that happened in Indonesia were coordinated by Hambali under the auspices of Jamaah Islamiyah," Mappaseng told a news conference as quoted by AFP.

Mappaseng said that even as Hambali traveled from Thailand, to Cambodia, the Philippines, Malaysia and even Afghanistan, he had the final word on all proposed bombing plans of JI in Indonesia.

"Every project to be undertaken had to be submitted to Hambali," Mappaseng said, speaking through an interpreter on the sidelines of a police conference in Manila.