LAKSAMANA.Net, April 2, 2004 08:22 PM
Suspect Links Baasyir to Jemaah Islamiyah
Laksamana.Net - A Malaysian member of regional terrorism network Jemaah
Islamiyah says he took orders from radical Indonesian cleric Abu Bakar Baasyir,
whose impending release from jail later this month could be stymied by police plans
to interrogate him next week.
Mohamed Nasir Abbas, who was arrested last April in Indonesia and is now being
detained in Jakarta, last month told private Malaysian television network TV3 he was
under the orders of Baasyir.
TV3 says it interviewed Abbas and three other alleged Jemaah Islamiyah officials in
Jakarta on March 11. The interviews are to be broadcast by TV3 at 8.30pm Friday
(2/4/04) in a program entitled ‘Jemaah Islamiyah – One Confession/Exposure'.
Human rights activists in Malaysia have criticized the program because Abbas and
the other men are yet to be tried in court.
The Abolish ISA Movement, which opposes detention without trial under Malaysia's
harsh Internal Security Act, says the men might have been forced to make false
statements.
Abbas told TV3 he led a Jemaah Islamiyah cell (Mantiqi) responsible for Borneo,
Mindanao in the southern Philippines and parts of Sulawesi.
"When I was leader of the Mantiqi 3, I was under the emir of Jemaah Islamiyah,
Ustadz [Islamic teacher] Abu Bakar Baasyir," he was quoted as saying by the
Associated Press, which obtained a transcript of the interviews.
Abbas did not directly link Baasyir to any of the terror attacks that have been blamed
on Jemaah Islamiyah, including the October 2002 Bali nightclub bombings that killed
202 people and the August 2003 JW Marriott Hotel bombing in Jakarta that killed 12.
But he said Baasyir and the alleged former operations chief of Jemaah Islamiyah,
Hambali, had distributed a religious edict from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden
calling on Muslims to kill Americans.
"It was a fatwa from Osama bin Laden which said that now is the time for all Muslims
to defend themselves and take revenge against Americans, because Americans have
oppressed and killed Muslims everywhere," he said.
"Therefore we can take revenge by killing Americans wherever they are, irrespective of
whether they are armed or not, whether they are soldiers or civilians or women, elderly
people or children," he added.
Only seven Americans died in the Bali bombings. The only foreigner killed in the
Marriott bombing was a Dutchman.
Abbas didn't say when the fatwa was circulated among Jemaah Islamiyah officials,
but AP said it was believed to have been shortly before a series of bombings that
killed 19 people in nine Indonesian cities on Christmas Eve 2000. Not a single
American was killed in those attacks, which targeted churches and houses of
Indonesian priests.
"People who believed in the fatwa carried out bombings. Therefore they bombed
churches. The bombing in Bali was based on a policy to take revenge against
America," said Abbas.
Hambali, who was arrested last August in Thailand, is now reportedly being detained
by US authorities on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia.
Baasyir (65), who is nearing the end of an 18-month sentence for immigration
violations and forging documents, has long denied any involvement in Jemaah
Islamiyah or al Qaeda, although he has praised bin Laden as a “true Muslim fighter”.
He was arrested on October 19, 2002, in the aftermath of the Bali bombings, although
authorities were unable to produce hard evidence linking him to the attacks.
In September 2003 Central Jakarta District Court sentenced him to four years in
prison for treason, immigration violations and forging documents. But the court said he
was not guilty of leading Jemaah Islamiyah or masterminding a plot to use religious
violence to overthrow the government.
In December 2003, Jakarta High Court announced it had overturned the cleric's
treason conviction and reduced his jail sentence to three years. The Supreme Court
last month further reduced the sentence to one and a half years, which means the
cleric should be due for release by the end of April.
The US and Australian governments strongly protested the sentence reductions and
urged Indonesia to reopen investigations into Baasyir.
Speaking from Central Jakarta's Salemba prison, Baasyir on Friday strongly denied
the allegations made against him by the Malaysian suspects. He claimed they had
been forced to incriminate him as part of a US-led conspiracy to have his detention
extended.
"It is certain they were tortured. Police engineered their confessions… Both the
Indonesian and Malaysian police are working for American interests. Now the United
States is trying to arrange for my arrest to be extended," he was quoted as saying by
AP.
Meanwhile, one of Baasyir's lawyers said Indonesian police will question the cleric
next week in an effort to link him to the Bali bombings. "I was informed that he will be
questioned on Wednesday. I heard they want to link him with the Bali bombings,"
Wirawan Adnan was quoted as saying by Agence France-Presse.
National Police chief General Dai Bachtiar earlier said police had received additional
intelligence to allow them to question Baasyir. "We are developing information from
witnesses both at home and abroad such as Malaysia and Singapore, in addition to
information from Hambali," he was quoted as saying by state news agency Antara.
The US recently provided Indonesia with information on the interrogation of Hambali,
but Baasyir says the “evidence” has been faked.
"This is a tyrannical move. This amounts to terror against Indonesian law enforcement
and independence," he was quoted as saying by Adnan.
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