The Australian, December 18, 2004
Lodhi 'a leader at terror boot camp'
Martin Chulov
ACCUSED terrorist Faheem Khalid Lodhi was the go-to man for seven Indonesian
militants who trained in urban warfare at the main base of outlawed terror group
Lashkar-e-Taiba, ASIO alleges.
As part of an affidavit sworn to support withholding some evidence from Lodhi's
committal hearing, ASIO director-general Dennis Richardson claimed the former
Sydney architect was a supervisor at the camp near the Pakistan city of Lahore.
Relying heavily on claims from alleged Jemaah Islamiah acolyte Mohammed Arif bin
Naharudin, now under detention in Singapore, the affidavit said Lodhi was known in
the camp in 2001 as Abu Said.
Naharudin told investigators from Australia and Singapore earlier this year that he had
seen Lodhi, whom he knew as Abu Said, every day for more than a month.
He described him as about five foot, eight inches (172.2cm) tall, with a small belly, a
black beard and wearing Pakistani clothes.
Naharudin claims he had only spoken to Lodhi on several occasions, on one of which
Lodhi had allegedly said to him: "Don't be shy, if you want anything come to me."
Another time, Naharudin claims he spoke to Lodhi when arranging for shirts belonging
to seven Indonesian men to be cleaned. The Indonesians were alleged to have been
members of Laskar Jihad, a militant group dedicated to fighting Christians in
the province of Ambon.
Lodhi's other alleged duties included handing out supplies, equipment for lessons and
arranging visits to a doctor.
Notes taken by Australian Federal Police agents when they interviewed Naharudin
show he claimed to have definitely seen Lodhi at the camp at the end of 2001.
The notes of the AFP interview show Naharudin said Lodhi had a supervisory role, and
attended morning and afternoon prayers as well as paramilitary training drills.
He did not live on the base, arriving and leaving each day on a Honda C70 motorbike.
Large parts of the publicly available ASIO affidavit were blacked out. A separate
affidavit was tendered by AFP Commissioner Mick Keelty.
Both swore disclosing any further details of the Naharudin debriefs would threaten
Australia's national security.
Naharudin, 21, has been detained by Singapore's Internal Security since returning
from south Asia last year.
He is alleged to have been a conduit between Islamic militants from Southeast Asia
and those from the subcontinent who were aligned to LET.
Naharudin provided crucial insights into the LET training structure, revealing there
were five training courses.
The first course included training in basic military tactics, weapons and religion.
Trainees then learned techniques such as ambush, evasion and guerilla tactics
followed by soldiering and basic explosives. Course four was urban warfare training,
including surveillance, secret writing and dead-letter drops. Graduates finally moved
on to an advanced explosives course.
© The Australian
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