http://www.smh.com.au/news/0201/22/world/world1.html
Tuesday, January 22, 2002
Muslim infiltrators 'training Papuan militia'
By Lindsay Murdoch
(Herald Correspondent, Jakarta)
A militant Muslim group blamed for killing hundreds of Christians in the
Maluku islands has infiltrated the Indonesian province of Papua, where
its fighters are training pro-Jakarta militia, human rights activists claim.
The group, Laskar Jihad, had sent more than 100 of its armed fighters
into the Papua district of Fak Fak, and was operating military training
camps there, said a spokesman for the human rights group ELSHAM, based
in the Papuan capital, Jayapura.
Indonesian authorities in Fak Fak were backing the training that Laskar
Jihad fighters had been giving members of the East Merah Putih (Red and
White) militia, the group said.
ELSHAM said yesterday that one of its activists who worked for the
Government in Fak Fak and his family had been repeatedly threatened with
death after he told police about a Laskar Jihad training camp that
police raided last month. Explosives, hand-made weapons and poisonous
arrows had been confiscated, ELSHAM said.
A Papuan police spokesman in Jayapura confirmed yesterday that two or
three people would appear in court on charges relating to the raid.
Laskar Jihad, originally based in Java, is Indonesia's largest and most
violent Muslim group. It has sent hundreds, if not thousands, of
fighters to the Malukus over the past two years to join a jihad against
Christians.
More than 5000 people have been killed in the conflict.
United States intelligence officials have been quoted as saying Laskar
Jihad is linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorists. The
Afghanistan-trained Laskar Jihad leader, Jafar Umar Thalib, denies any
link with al-Qaeda. He says that last year he turned down an offer of
financial backing and an alliance from a bin Laden aide.
A spokesman for Laskar Jihad in Jakarta yesterday denied the group had a
presence in Fak Fak.
The Papuan police spokesman said that several weeks ago a man who had
arrived in the town of Sorong from the Malukus had been arrested
carrying 10 bombs. Police have not linked the man to the Laskar Jihad.
Indonesia is coming under increasing pressure to crack down on militant
Muslim groups because US and Asian diplomats say there is growing
evidence of al-Qaeda cells active in the Philippines, Malaysia,
Singapore and Indonesia. Intelligence officials in Singapore say the
leadership of Jemaah Islamiah, a group accused of targeting US interests
and the Australian embassy in Singapore, is based in the Indonesian city
of Solo.
But Indonesian police have said they lack the evidence to charge the
outspoken Jemaah Islamiah leader, Abu Bakar Bashir.
Meanwhile, the commander of Indonesia's Kopassus special forces,
Major-General Amirul Isnaeni, has challenged police statements that
evidence points to the involvement of Kopassus soldiers in the
assassination of Papua's flamboyant independence leader, Theys Eluay.
Mr Eluay was found dead in his car on November 11 after attending a
Kopassus function in Jayapura.
--
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