|
Asia terror attacks 'inevitable'
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-02-05 09:17 Additional terrorist attacks
are "inevitable" in the Asia-Pacific region, Australia's foreign minister
Alexander Downer says.
Downer spoke Wednesday at the opening of an anti-terrorism conference on the
bomb-scarred tourist island of Bali.
He said said terrorists were actively training, recruiting and using
"legitimate fronts to pursue barbaric ends."
"Terrorist groups are cooperating across the region, transiting borders using
one country to train in, another to raise funds in and another for safe haven.
They are working together to maximize the impact of their activities," Alexander
Downer said.
Combating the al Qaeda-linked Southeast Asian terror group Jemaah Islamiyah
topped the agenda at the two-day regional conference attended by ministers and
senior officials from 33 countries, including U.S. Attorney General John
Ashcroft.
The countries are expected to bolster cooperation in intelligence gathering
and offer new anti-terror aid for developing countries like Indonesia.
It's unlikely they'll sign any comprehensive agreements that would enable
them to move beyond the two-way pacts that have damaged Jemaah Islamiyah, but
failed to defeat it.
Critics say mutual suspicions have prevented the creation of region-wide
mechanisms, such as a multinational police force.
Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri told the conference delegates that
"wider and more effective cooperation" has now become "our common duty."
"This solid coordination mechanism is necessary, for only in this way would
we be able to penetrate into the terrorist network and cells that are neatly,
tightly and closely built," she said.
Downer announced the opening of a transnational crime center in the
Indonesian capital, Jakarta. Run jointly by Indonesia and Australia, it will
offer anti-terror training and be an information clearinghouse.
The center will foster anti-terrorism technical skills like "forensic
training, strike forces, bomb disposal units and training, response training for
sabotage and hostage-taking," said Bali's police chief, Inspector-General I Made
Mangku Pastika.
Also Wednesday, Indonesia and Australia signed an accord on the exchange of
financial intelligence to fight money laundering -- the latest of nine
anti-terror agreements signed between the two countries.
Hundreds of police and troops patrolled near the conference at Bali's Grand
Hyatt beach resort, with a police ship just off the coast. Bali was the site of
the October 12, 2002 twin nightclub bombings that killed 202 people, 88 of them
Australian tourists.
The attack inspired Australia and Indonesia to propose Bali as the venue for
the anti-terror conference.
"This despicable act has now done nothing but awaken the world and increase
the awareness that the threat of terror has spread to all corners of the earth,"
Megawati said of the Bali attack.
Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, has been the target of
numerous terror attacks.
Jemaah Islamiyah was blamed for both the Bali attack and the August 5, 2003
bombing that killed 12 people at the J.W. Marriott Hotel in Jakarta.
"More attacks that threaten the safety and security of our citizens are
inevitable," Downer said.
"In our region collectively we have disrupted the Jemaah Islamiyah network
through the capture and detention of well over 200 JI members, but we have not
disabled it. Key operatives are still at large and JI remains highly resilient
and committed to its cause.
"It is planning for the long term, actively training and recruiting young men
as the next generation of leaders," he said, adding that terrorists are
employing "false identities, money laundering, fraud and extortion as tools of
the trade."
Regional intelligence officials say raids and arrests have damaged the group,
but it remains dangerous -- partly because it's been broken into isolated cells
willing to lash out on their own.
Jemaah Islamiyah's operatives are reportedly finding recruits with ease at
mosques and other Islamic institutions, playing on Muslims' suspicions of the
West and their feelings that the Iraq and Afghan wars are campaigns to destroy
Islam.
"What remains is their fanaticism -- that won't change," said Rodolfo
Mendoza, a senior Philippine police official. "There is tactical dislocation but
they will look for a day when they can come back and plan for something bigger.
They want to surpass 9/11."
Jemaah Islamiyah has an estimated 2,000 operatives on the run throughout
Southeast Asia. They include bombing suspects Azahari bin Husin and Noordin
Mohammed Top, plus an Afghan-trained militant named Zulkarnaen, whom authorities
say has replaced Hambali -- the group's captured former operations
chief.
| |
 |
|
|
|
|
Today's
Top News |
|
|
|
Top World
News |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
