Newsletter No. 238
April 13, 2006

 

Adam Stott (Shingetsu Member No. 17) of The University of Kitakyushu has brought our attention to a Kyodo News story about arrested Indonesian terrorists who were surveying Japanese and other targets for attack. It would appear that they were not very efficient operators.

This is now the third case (that we know of) that Islamist terrorists have been alleged to be organizing attacks on Japan or Japanese interests. The first was the Lionel Dumont case, the second was the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan case, and now this case in Indonesia.

Japan has been lucky that in all three cases that have emerged so far, the would-be terrorists seem to have been complete morons.

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INDONESIAN TERRORIST SUSPECTS CONFESS TO SURVEYING JAPANESE TARGETS

JAKARTA, April 8 (Kyodo News) -- Two Indonesian terrorist suspects have confessed they surveyed some Japanese targets in at least two cities in East Java Province last year as a part of "programs" to rob, kill and kidnap Americans and citizens of U.S.-allied countries, according to a prosecution document obtained Saturday.

Government prosecutors sought 10 years of imprisonment each for the suspects, Ahmad Rafiq Ridho and Joko Trihatmanto, late last month. The two have been on trial since January, and verdicts are expected within a few weeks.

Both have been brought to justice for hiding Malaysia's Noordin Mohammad Top, the most-wanted terrorist suspect in Southeast Asia, and helping him to collect money to finance terrorist activities.

According to the document, Ridho and Trihatmanto met Top on an unspecified date last year in the East Java town of Mojokerto.

During the meeting, Top briefed them on his "programs" to target the interests of the United States and its allies and kidnap and kill Americans and people whose countries are U.S. allies, the document says.

Top later instructed them to survey possible targets for robberies, kidnapping and killings in the provincial capital of Surabaya and towns of Malang and Mojokerto, it alleges.

"They were ordered to investigate whether a mushroom factory in Surabaya belongs to a Japanese national. It was found later that it was not, but it belongs to a Chinese-descent Manadonese," the document says, referring to an ethnicity in North Sulawesi Province.

They were also asked to check whether the locations of the Japanese and U.S. consulate generals in Surabaya were "matched to a map owned by Noordin Mohammad Top and they were," the document adds.

Ridho and Trihatmanto, it says, were ordered to check whether there were citizens of the U.S. and its allies working at the Paiton power plant in Mojokerto, but after checking, they were unsure.

The plant is run by P.T. Paiton Energy Co., which is partly owned by Mitsui & Co. of Japan, General Electric Capital Corp. of the United States and International Power Plc. of Britain.

Ridho and Trihatmanto also checked to confirm whether the general manager of the Novotel Hotel in Surabaya was an Australian, but they failed.

Some malls in Surabaya and Malang, which were not identified in the document, were surveyed to find whether Americans and people of other targeted nationalities shop and eat there, but both terrorist suspects only found ethnic Chinese Indonesians.

They traveled around Surabaya and Malang to find synagogues, but found none.

Ridho is the brother of Fathurrohman al-Ghozi, a high-ranking member of al-Qaida-linked Southeast Asian terrorist network Jemaah Islamiyah, who was shot to death by Philippine troops in 2003.

Jemaah Islamiyah has been blamed for a series of bombing attacks in Southeast Asia, including on the resort island of Bali in 2002 during which 202 people were killed, mostly Western holidaymakers.

He was arrested in April last year for illegally possessing weapons and explosives as well as helping Top to collect money for carrying out his terrorist attacks.

Trihatmanto, 34, was arrested in August last year for his alleged involvement in the bombings in front of the Kauman Great Mosque and the Central Post Office in central Java's Yogyakarta on the 2000 New Year Eve.

Police later found out that the cellular phone vendor had hidden Top at his house in December 2004.