LAKSAMANA.Net, December 18, 2003 11:58 PM
Four Detained Students Linked to Terrorism
Laksamana.Net - Four Indonesian Islamic students, including the younger brother of
alleged terrorist mastermind Hambali, will be charged with facilitating terrorism, police
said Thursday (18/12/03).
National Police spokesman Brigadier General Sunarko said the four suspects –
Rusman 'Gun Gun' Gunawan, Mohammad Syaifudin, Ilham Sofyandi and Furqon
Abdullah – had deliberately provided assistance to Hambali.
"They are formally arrested beginning today for deliberately facilitating acts of
terrorism…These people helped Hambali," Sunarko was quoted as saying by the
Associated Press.
Hambali's younger brother Rusman has reportedly admitted to channeling $50,000
and telecommunications equipment to his sibling, but apparently denies any direct
involvement in terrorism.
Authorities believe Hambali is the former commander of Southeast Asian terror
network Jemaah Islamiyah, which has been linked to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda
organization.
Hambali, who is suspected of masterminding several terror attacks in Southeast Asia,
was arrested in Thailand in August. He is now being held by US authorities at an
undisclosed location.
The four students suspected of helping him were among six Indonesians arrested in
Pakistan in early September for alleged involvement in a "sleeper cell” of Jemaah
Islamiyah.
They were returned to Indonesia a week ago and immediately taken into police
custody for questioning. Two of the students – David Pintarto and Anwar As-Shiddiqi
– were released on late Tuesday due to a lack of evidence.
The six Indonesians were among 19 foreign students netted by Pakistani security
officials during raids on Islamic schools in Karachi in September. The 13 others, all
Malaysians, were deported in November. Five of them are now being held for a
two-year period under Malaysia's tough Internal Security Act.
Lacking an equivalent of the Internal Security Act, Indonesian police in theory can
only hold suspects for a week without pressing charges.
National Police chief General Dai Bachtiar said the decision to arrest the four
students was based on intelligence, although he emphasized that further information
was being sought through interrogation. "We have a lot of intelligence information
showing four of them had links with Hambali. So their interrogation will go in that
direction," he was quoted as saying by state news agency Antara.
Bachtiar implied that police still lacked hard evidence to completely verify the
intelligence. "We are still trying to dig deeper into their roles in connection with a
series of cases including ones related to Hambali,” he was quoted as saying by
Reuters.
"We need to match intelligence information that they met Hambali so that we can use
the intelligence as evidence in court," he added.
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