Trial date set for RI detainee in U.S.

Trial date set for RI detainee in U.S.

JAKARTA: The trial of Agus Budiman, an Indonesian national currently detained in the United States for his alleged terrorist connections, will commence on March 2 at the federal court of Alexandria, Virginia.

"Agus and his lawyer have received the court's schedule," Agus' younger brother Akhmad Faisal told Antara in New York on Tuesday.

Agus was arrested by the Immigration and Naturalization Service in Virginia on Oct. 30, 2001 for visa violations and forged documents. Local prosecutors, however, altered the focus of his charges to possible links to terrorism.

Agus, of Saudi Arabian descent, is believed to have helped Mohammed bin Nasser Belfast obtain an identity card and a driver's license.

Earlier, the U.S. media reported that Belfast was closely related to Osama bin Laden, the Saudi Arabian billionaire said to be behind the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11 last year, in which over 3,000 people perished. -- Antara