Western Resistance

« UK: Thousands Of Children Risk Abuse In Islamic Schools | | Israel: Iran Funding Islamic Jihad's Terrorism »

March 22, 2006

Indonesia: A New Leader For Islamist Terror Group?

Today's Jakarta Post reports that a 37-year old individual who trained in Afghanistan, has become the new head of notorious terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, the group responsible for the bombings on Bali in 2002 and 2005. The man's name is Abu Dujana.

Dujana is a former close associate of Riduan Isamuddin, aka Hambali (pictured), who led Jemaah Islamiyah until his capture on August 11, 2003 in Thailand. Currently, Hambali is in US custody at an undisclosed location, and his wife is in prison in Malaysia.

Abu Dujana trained with Hambali in Afhanistan, while the Mujahideen fought against the Soviets. The announcement of Abu Dujana's ascent to head the terror group was made by Colonel Petrus Reinhard Golose, from Indonesia's counterterrism task force. Recently Petrus Reinhard Golose described the links of Jemaah Islamiah with al-Qaeda, and claimed that the group's terror activities in southeast Asia were sponsored by al-Qaeda funding. Now Petrus has said that Anu Dujana was well known to, and trusted by, al-Qaeda.

Petrus stated that Noordin Mohammed Top, the former financier and recruiter for Jemaah Islamiyah, was now working outside of this group and declared himself to be al-Qaeda's representative in southeast Asia. Currently on the run from police, and is thought to be in hiding in West Java. Petrus, addressing members of Indonesia's foreign correspondents' club, said that even if Top was caught, the risk of attacks would remain.

He told the assembled journalists that since 2000, police had arrested more than 270 Islamist extremists.

So who is Abu Dujana? His name is actually a nom de guerre, being derived from a bloodthirsty associate of Mohammed, renowned for his acts of killing, who traditionally wore a red cloth around his head when he went out to commit slaughter, calling this item his "turban of death". The same name has been used as an alias by other terrorists, including an associate of Abu Musab al Zarkawi, a Kashmiri fighter, and a Lebanese Sunni terrorist. So much for the name.

The man in Indonesia who calls himself Abu Dujana has the real name of Ainal Bahri, according to an earlier interview given by Petrus to the Australian. When the "spiritual leader" of Jemaah Islamiyah was jailed for his involvement with authorising the 2002 blasts on Bali, which killed 202 people, Abu Rusdan took over as spiritual chief of the JI network. Rusdan was captured in 2003, and was sentenced to three and a half years imprisonment in April 2004 for hiding Ali Ghufron (Mukhlas), one of the Bali bombers. 43-year old Rusdan was designated by the US as a terrorist in May last year, in a move which froze his assets.

Colonel Petrus Golose did not state exactly when Abu Dujanar came take over as "Emir" following the incarceration of Rusdan, but implied it happened automatically. He said that Dujana same from Cianjur, a town in West Java. It is the same town where Hambali came from. He had taught at an Islamic boarding school in Malaysia, the Lukman al-Hakiem. Noordin Top also taught at this institution.

A report by Sidney Jones, director of the southeast Asian branch of the International Crisis Group, provides more details of Abu Dujana's life. In this report, entitled "How Much Can We Learn From Past Behaviour" (27 Sept 2004) she states that Abu Dujana had met with Noordin Top and Azahari bin Husin (JI's "bombmaker") in June 2003, while the two had been plotting the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta, which would see 12 people killed on 5th August that year. She said that Dujana met the bombers again in late August, when they were fugitives after the attack had taken place.

Petrus states that Dujana has charisma and good leadership qualities, and claims that the meetings described by Dr Jones indicated that "Top and Azahari reported their activities to him - that's how we know he has become the leader."

Earlier this month, UPI.com and Asia Security Monitor quoted the South China Morning Post who reported Abu Dujana's accession to the role of "Emir" of Jemaah Islamiyah. According to this, Abu Dujana had been Abu Rusdan's secretary, and had graduated from the Afghanistan Mujahideen Military Academy in 1991. His instructor there, Nasir Abas, said that students were taught firearms use and bomb-assembly techniques. Abas said Dujana had leadership qualities which inspired loyalty, but he was neither hard nor radical.

Last week, AKI wrote on the problems of terror in Indonesia, quoting from Ken Conboy, a veteran observer of terrorism in the reagion. Conboy claimed that Indonesia has released several terrorists. "They served their time according to the law and there is not much that can be done about it. It is right that they are released but the danger of them falling back into terrorism is real," he said.

Among those released has been the former Emir of Jemaah Islamiyah, Abu Rusdan, who was set free in January this year. Conboy is not fully convinced that Abu Dujana is the current leader of Jemaah Islamiyah. "Dujana has been known for a while but I am not too sure whether he is the new operative head of the group," he said.

Sian Powell, writing in the Australian states that some have claimed that the issue of whether Abu Dujana is the practical head of Jemaah Islamiyah is "irrelevant, because JI has disintegrated into independent cells and the hierarchy now has no power."

Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at March 22, 2006 9:45 PM

Comments

Post a comment