Salam, Setahu saya banyak juga pemerintah kota/lokal yang menolak membantu FBI karena menurut mereka banyak pertanyaan yang diajukan (misalnya: agama) adalah pertanyaan illegal.
Jabat erat, Ahmad Syamil Jonesboro, AR www.clt.astate.edu/asyamil -------------------------------------------------- Chronicle of Higher Education Monday, December 10, 2001 http://chronicle.com/free/2001/12/2001121001n.htm Several Universities Decline to Assist Federal Agents in Questioning of Foreign Students By SARA HEBEL Several public universities have declined to help federal investigators arrange or conduct interviews with foreign students who may be among those on a list of 5,000 people whom the U.S. Justice Department wants to question as it seeks information about terrorist activities. In the past two weeks, Eastern Michigan University, Michigan State University, the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, and the University of Wisconsin at Madison have said that their campus police officers would not participate in the federal government's interviewing process. Many administrators said they would not allow their police departments to do so because the list of those being sought for questioning was broad and consisted of people who were not criminal suspects. Some campus officials also said they feared that involving campus police officers could hurt relationships between the university and its students. And most said that university participation in the process didn't seem to be critical to helping federal investigators get their job done anyway. Justice Department officials have sought to question men between the ages of 18 and 33 who have entered the United States on nonimmigrant visas -- which include student visas -- since January 1, 2000. They want to talk mostly to men from countries where U.S. intelligence officials have found a significant presence of members of Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda terrorist network. There are no official estimates of how many students may be on the federal list. But many campus officials assume that a significant number are students, given the ages of the men being sought and the visa categories that officials are focusing on. In Wisconsin, a total of about 100 people are being sought for interviews, but officials at the university there and the U.S. attorney's office in Madison said on Friday that they did not know how many of those might be students. Last Thursday, university officials issued a statement saying that they would not participate in any of the interviews, although they would give government officials some attendance records and other information that they are allowed to release under state and federal laws. The day before, federal officials had asked if any members of a Madison-area antiterrorism task force -- which includes the University of Wisconsin's police department -- would volunteer to help federal investigators conduct the interviews. "Let me emphasize that the university always cooperates fully with local, state, and federal law-enforcement investigations of suspected criminal activity. We will continue to do so in the future," John Wiley, chancellor of Wisconsin-Madison, said in a statement. "But university officials, including me, believe the criteria to select individuals for interviews ... is broadly based and appears to consist of people who are not suspected of any crimes or suspicious activities." In an interview, Mr. Wiley added that he worried about how the university's participation in the information-gathering process might alter students' "trust" of campus police officials. "I just didn't think it would be appropriate," he said. Grant C. Johnson, the U.S. attorney in Madison, said he disagreed with Mr. Wiley's decision but that the lack of university participation was "not a big deal." "It doesn't make any difference because we didn't really need their help," Mr. Johnson said. In Michigan, meanwhile, federal officials are seeking interviews with a total of about 800 people. About 70 to 80 of those individuals are in the Ann Arbor area, and University of Michigan officials believe that "many or most" of those are students, said Julie Peterson, associate vice president for media relations and public affairs. In late November, Ms. Peterson issued a statement saying that the university had received a written request from U.S. officials to help conduct interviews but that the institution would not participate. "Since none of those identified for questioning are suspected of or associated with criminal activity, we have decided that our public-safety personnel will not participate in the interviews," her statement read. "If criminal activity is suspected at any time, campus police will participate fully in follow-up investigations." Like their counterparts at Wisconsin, University of Michigan officials also said they would provide some information sought by federal investigators as long as the request did not violate state or federal laws. In addition, Ms. Peterson said university officials were allowing some interviews to be conducted on the campus for students' convenience. Meanwhile, officials at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign decided late last month that campus police officers would help federal officials conduct interviews of students. Bill Murphy, associate director for public affairs at the Illinois campus, said the university shares the other institutions' concerns about protecting students' rights during the interviews. "We just have different solutions to the same question," he said. "After extensive discussion, we decided that it was in the best interest of our students if we did participate because of the sensitivity we believed our police would show to our students."
