REUTERS, Fri Nov 11, 7:07 AM ET
Indonesians see militants as heroes: official
By Achmad Sukarsono
Indonesia needs more cooperation from the public to track down Islamic militants who
are sometimes regarded as heroes in the world's most populous Muslim nation,
Jakarta's top counter-terrorism official said on Friday.
Speaking two days after the killing of one of Southeast Asia's most wanted militants,
police general Ansyaad Mbai said some residents had noticed suspicious activity at
the house where Azahari Husin had holed up, but did not report anything.
Muslim clerics were increasingly encouraging Indonesians to speak out, despite
misgivings among ordinary people about Jakarta's support for the U.S.-led war on
terrorism, he added.
Azahari was killed during a gunbattle with police in the town of Batu in East Java on
Wednesday. He was shot dead just before a fellow militant exploded a bomb, police
said on Friday.
"We are 50-50 on the ground," said Mbai, head of the counter-terrorism desk at the
chief security minister's office, referring to support for police efforts to catch militants.
"At times, terrorists are merely seen as the enemy of the police when they should be
seen as the public enemy, the enemy of the nation, of religion. Sometimes, terrorists
are even considered as heroes," he said in a telephone interview.
"The Indonesian nation has now seen for themselves that these terrorists do not hide
in the jungles, but they blend into the crowd."
Regional countries have welcomed the death of Malaysian Azahari, a master
bombmaker blamed for a string of attacks in recent years, but some cautioned it
would not eliminate the threat of radical violence in Southeast Asia.
Posters of Azahari and another suspect wanted for several major bomb attacks on
Western targets in recent years, Malaysian Noordin M. Top, have been plastered all
over Indonesia.
Mbai said police had received valuable information from the public before raiding the
Batu house where Azahari was hiding, but added:
"Many residents who had noticed strange activity from that house only stepped
forward after the raid. If they had come out earlier, we could have acted faster," said
Mbai.
HELP FROM CLERICS
Anti-terror campaigns in Indonesia have often faced challenges because of the belief
in conspiracy theories that the United States wants to attack Islam as well as ample
space given to militant voices and their sympathizers in Indonesian media.
Some coverage has helped militants appear as defenders of Islam. But Mbai said
Muslim clerics were beginning to help police after a period of reluctance to condemn
militants, who regularly use religion as a shield for their actions.
Local media have said police came close to catching Top on Wednesday in the
central Java city of Semarang when they detained another militant who had come from
the Batu hideout.
"It was a pity he could get away but the police are on him," said Mbai, without giving
details of what happened.
Police have had several nears misses in catching Top and also Azahari before
Wednesday's raid.
Dubbed the "demolition man" by newspapers in his native Malaysia, Azahari was the
suspected brains behind several bomb attacks on Western targets in Indonesia and
the top bomb maker in Jemaah Islamiah, a shadowy network linked to al Qaeda.
Authorities say the electronics expert designed and supervised the making of the car
bomb that caused the most damage in 2002 attacks on the resort island of Bali which
killed 202 people.
While Azahari has been the key Jemaah Islamiah bombmaker, Top's special talent
has been in recruiting suicide bombers in poverty-stricken Indonesia, security experts
have said.
© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.
|