RI looks to boost terror fight: Downer

RI looks to boost terror fight: Downer

Paul Holmes, Reuters/Canberra

Indonesia is looking at ways to strengthen coordination among its
security services in the fight against militants and Australia
will do whatever it can to help, Foreign Minister Alexander
Downer said on Tuesday.

"Coordinating their efforts could make a significant
difference to their efforts to catch people, track them down and
identify who is responsible for the different kinds of terrorist
activities and where they are coming from," Downer said.

He spoke to Reuters before leaving for Indonesia for a
memorial service on Wednesday on the third anniversary of the
Bali nightclub bombings that killed 202 people, including 88
Australians.

Australia wants Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim
nation, to ban the militant network Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) and
exclude its jailed spiritual leader Abu Bakar Ba'asyir from a
remission program open to most prisoners.

Ba'asyir was jailed for 30 months for his role in the Bali
bombings in March but his sentence was cut by 135 days on
Indonesia's Independence Day. It could be cut further at the end
of the fasting month of Ramadhan in November.

Downer made clear he did not expect substantive progress on
the Ba'asyir issue or a JI ban during his trip and said effective
counter-terrorism operations were ultimately more important.

"It would certainly play well to the international community,
it would certainly demonstrate their commitment to fighting
terrorism," Downer said.

"But in practice, I think, the task is much more for them to
make sure their counter-terrorism agencies are really well
coordinated and that they are able to get (intelligence) input
from their foreign partners," Downer said.

He declined to say whether an announcement on some sort of new
umbrella security agency would be made during his two-day visit,
which his office said would include talks in Jakarta on Wednesday
with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

JI has been accused of involvement in several bombings in
Indonesia, including an attack on the Australian embassy in 2004
that killed 10 Indonesians and this month's suicide bombings on
Bali when four Australians were among the 23 dead.

Downer said better information sharing among the army, police,
customs and intelligence services could make a real difference in
the Indonesian archipelago, where travel by boat to and from
neighboring countries often went unrecorded and allowed militants
to slip in and out of havens in the Philippines.

"It's not just a question of knowing who's moving in and out.
It's even having a system where people are reporting that they
are moving in and out. It's not as sophisticated as it is at
Sydney airport," Downer said.

Police in several countries have linked JI to al-Qaeda but the
Indonesian authorities have argued they cannot ban it since it is
not an established, structured group.

Downer expressed some understanding for that position.

"I've made the point that (a ban) would be a good step forward
but you'd always be having to prove that people belong to an
organization which would be hard to prove because they are not
paying a subscription or holding a membership card," he said.