Oct. 4
INDONESIA:
Indonesia's Bali police may question death-row bombers in blast probe
Police said they may interrogate the convicted bombers behind the 2002
Bali blasts, including three on death row, as they try to identify the
masterminds behind the latest attacks.
Bali police chief I Made Mangku Pastika said they were considering the
possibility of questioning the original Bali culprits to find out if they
knew any of the 3 suicide bombers who killed 19 people on Saturday night.
'That's one of the possibilities that we are exploring,' he told reporters
when asked about a report that the interrogation had already begun. 'It's
quite possible that we will pursue that kind of matter.'
The Sinar Harapan evening daily said police have already started to grill
3 figures in custody over the October 2002 blasts that killed 202 people
-- Imam Samudra, Amrozi and Ali Ghufran.
'The questioning is still going on. So far Imam Samudra remains
tight-lipped,' it quoted an anonymous police source in Bali as saying.
Pastika said police were concentrating on identifying the 3 dead suicide
bombers, whose severed heads were recovered relatively undamaged.
Another convicted 2002 Bali bomber, Ali Imron, said from his Jakarta jail
cell that he did not recognise the three, but that he believes the blasts
were the work of Malaysian bombmaker Azahari Husin and his followers.
Imron told the Indo Pos newspaper that judging from the press reports the
perpetrators were 'those same people'. When asked who he was referring to,
he said: 'Who else if not the group of Dr. Azahari.'
Pastika ridiculed the two Malaysian explosive experts, Azahari and Noordin
Mohammad Top, who are widely suspected of involvement, saying they were
cowards for training others to sacrifice their lives.
'People who possess those kinds of skills are afraid to die. They do not
have the courage to commit suicide, they do not have the bravado,' he
said, accusing them of training other people to die for their cause.
The pair have evaded capture despite being linked to the 2002 Bali
bombing, the 2003 attack on Marriott Hotel in Jakarta and the 2004 blast
at the Australian embassy there.
Pastika fended off criticism that the investigation has moved too slowly.
'Actually this case is already half solved. On the 2nd day we were able to
determine that this was a suicide bombing,' he said.
He said two people were being interrogated as part of the investigation
into the blasts, but so far there was no indication they were involved.
'They are just being interrogated and there are as yet no strong
indications that they are involved in the bombings,' he said, adding they
were taken into detention 2 days ago in Bali.
National police deputy spokesman Sunarko Danu Ardanto said police have so
far questioned 39 witnesses from the 3 bomb sites.
(source: Forbes)
