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Terror arrest: Cause for
caution
By B Raman
 The arrest
of Riduan Isamuddin, alias Hambali, widely projected by
the intelligence agencies of the United States and the
countries of Southeast Asia as the operational brain
behind Jemaah Islamiya (JI) and as the suspected
mastermind behind many of the terrorist attacks of the
past in the region, is definitely an important triumph
in the fight against terrorism in Southeast Asia and
even farther afield.
His name has repeatedly
figured in the past as an associate or acquaintance of
Ramzi Yousef, currently in jail in the US for his
involvement in the February 1993 New York World Trade
Center explosion, Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, currently in
US custody since his arrest in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, in
March, and two of the hijackers of September 11, 2001 -
Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi - with whom he
allegedly attended a meeting in Malaysia in January
2000.
If Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, currently on trial
in Indonesia, is the ideological head of JI, Hambali is
viewed as its operational head, with a wide network of
jihadi contacts in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia -
which is his home state - Malaysia, where he moved from
Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Cambodia and
Thailand, where he was finally caught after a manhunt
for him lasting more than two years.
The
circumstances relating to his arrest are not clear. Some
reports say that he was arrested by Thai authorities in
the central temple town of Ayutthaya and handed over to
the US Federal Bureau of Investigation. Others claim
that telltale clues obtained by the FBI during the
interrogation of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad helped it to
locate his Thai hideout, and then the Thai authorities
came into the picture to arrest him.
What
happened to him after his arrest is also not clear. The
Thai defense minister was quoted as saying he had been
flown to Indonesia, but this has been denied by
Indonesian authorities. This would have been unwise
because of the support enjoyed by him among the jihadi
elements in his homeland and, hence, unlikely. Other
reports say he was airlifted by the FBI from Thailand
either to a US base in Australia or to the US naval base
in Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, where Abu Zubaidah,
then projected as the No 3 to Osama bin Laden, was also
taken after his arrest at Faisalabad, Pakistan, in March
last year.
Normally, the immediate interrogation
of Hambali should have been of greater interest to the
intelligence and security agencies of Indonesia and
other Southeast Asian countries because of his suspected
involvement in many, if not all, major terrorist
incidents of the region since 2000. Instead of handing
him over to Indonesia, the United States has reserved to
itself the right of first interrogation, with which the
agencies of Southeast Asia may not be associated. This
is for three reasons. First, the US keenness to find out
whether Hambali has knowledge of any plans of al-Qaeda
and other jihadi groups associated with it for new
terrorist strikes coinciding with the second anniversary
of September 11. Second, to quiz him on the whereabouts
of Osama bin Laden and his No 2, Ayman al-Zawahiri. And
third, to identify the sleeper or hitherto unidentified
agents of JI and al-Qaeda in the region and to get clues
regarding the present hideouts of those already
identified, but absconding.
The initial focus of
the interrogation would, therefore, be on obtaining from
him information that could help in preventing future
attacks and in the search for bin Laden and those still
at large. Only then would attention turn to questioning
him on the various reports received in the past about
Hambali, his links with bin Laden and al-Qaeda and his
role in the various terrorist incidents of this region,
currently under trial or investigation. It is, most
probably, at that stage that the intelligence agencies
of the regional countries would be associated with the
interrogation.
While the arrest of Hambali is an
important breakthrough, any over-optimism that this will
roll back the activities of the jihadi terrorists in
this region would be premature. The arrest of Abu
Zubaidah in March last year could not prevent the attack
on French submarine engineers and the explosion outside
the US Consulate in Karachi; the arrest of Ramzi
Binalshibh last September could not prevent the
terrorist strikes in Bali and in Mombassa, Kenya; and
the arrest of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad this March could
not prevent the terrorist attacks in Riyadh and
Casablanca.
Bin Laden's al-Qaeda, the
International Islamic Front and JI are not necessarily
leader-dependent in their operations. They have shown
remarkable operational autonomy, self-motivation and
resilience. The arrest or the killing of a leader,
however important, does not necessarily create a setback
from which the others are not able to recover. With or
without Hambali, JI will continue to be active until its
remaining membership and ground infrastructure are
identified and neutralized. The arrest of Hambali is an
important step in this direction, but unlikely to be a
decisive one. The intelligence and security agencies of
the region cannot, therefore, afford to lower their
guard.
B Raman is additional
secretary (retired), Cabinet Secretariat, government of
India, and currently director, Institute for Topical
Studies, Chennai; he is a former member of the National
Security Advisory Board of the government of India.
E-Mail: corde@vsnl.com. He
was also head of the counter-terrorism division of the
Research & Analysis Wing, India's external
intelligence agency, from 1988 to August 1994.
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