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Indonesia's Supreme Court has overturned militant cleric Abu Bakar Bashir's conviction on conspiracy charges in the 2002 Bali bombings. The verdict clears his name since he has already served his two-and-a-half year sentence. "The court today decided to uphold Bashir's judicial review," chief judge German Hoediarto said on Thursday.

LONDON - Four men arrested on suspicion of organizing terrorist training camps in Britain were tracked by Spanish investigators earlier this year as they traveled through Spain from France en route to North Africa, officials said Monday. The statement from Spain's interior ministry was the first public indication of an international link to the probe, which led to the arrests late Friday and early Saturday of 14 people suspected of training and recruiting for terror attacks. British prosecutors, meanwhile, said eight other people allegedly involved in a separate plot to blow up U.S.-bound aircraft are unlikely to be brought to...

Five years after the 9/11 attacks in the US and the start of the global war on terror, the Southeast Asian terrorist group, Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), which aims to create an Islamic caliphate in the region, has been weakened but remains a serious threat. "The group is much more fragmented," Sidney Jones, Southeast Asia director for the International Crisis Group told Adnkronos International (AKI). "But it is important to remember that part of JI is still intact and it is trying to regroup," said Jones. "The group is very adaptable and it still is a very serious threat," she added.

A senior US official on Friday raised the prospect of increasing US military deployments in Mindanao to confront Moro extremists who Washington says threaten regional stability. US Special Forces troops are known to deployed on a rotational basis in the Muslim southwestern portion of the former US colony. Although the 1987 Constitution bars them from actual combat, they have been providing intelligence, equipment, and training to elite troops combating extremist groups such as the Abu Sayyaf and their Jemaah Islamiyah allies from neighboring Indonesia. "We have a very good pace and rhythm of exercises. I think there may be...

JAKARTA, April 14 (IslamOnline) - Alleged Al-Qaeda operative, Yazid Sufaat, denied terror charges, while he admitted that he met two Arab nationals at his condominium in Kuala Lumpur two years ago, a news report from Malaysiakini.com said on Sunday. However, Sufaat, high on the FBI list of suspects from South East Asia, who might be members or operatives of the Al-Qaeda, stressed the duo could not be involved in the Sept 11 attacks as they were amputees shopping for prosthetic legs in Malaysia. The 37-year-old pathologist and former army captain, who is also a businessmen in Malaysia, told this to...

In December 2001, as the investigation into the U.S. anthrax attacks was gathering steam, coalition soldiers in Afghanistan uncovered what appeared to be an important clue: a trail of documents chronicling an attempt by al-Qaeda to create its own anthrax weapon. The documents told of a singular mission by a scientist named Abdur Rauf, an obscure, middle-aged Pakistani with alleged al-Qaeda sympathies and an advanced degree in microbiology. Using his membership in a prestigious scientific organization to gain access, Rauf traveled through Europe on a quest, officials say, to obtain both anthrax spores and the equipment needed to turn them...

Excerpt from report in English by Roel Pareno carried by Philippine newspaper The Philippine Star website on 7 October The wife of a top Indonesian terrorist claimed that the Philippines is a "prime target" for attacks by the Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) terrorist group because the country was one of the first to support the US-led war against terror after the 11 September 2001 attacks on the US, military officials said yesterday. The revelation by Istiada Oemar Sovie, alias Amenah Toha, the wife of suspected Jemaah Islamiyah Dulmatin, who uses only one name, came during her tactical interrogation. Sovie was captured...

No quarter in dealing with terrorists By KARL WEINBERG COMMUNITY VOICE On the subject of how to treat terrorists once caught in our fight against Islamofascists, the mainstream media would have us believe that we are torturing the captives by using sleep deprivation, loud rock'n' roll music, female interrogators and such. Many Americans, including me, do not believe this is torture at all. Instead, we believe that much harsher treatment should be used to get information from these terrorists. While the U.S. Supreme Court, Sens. John McCain and Lindsay Graham have said these terrorists are covered under Common Article three...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Treasury Department on Thursday named the Philippine and Indonesian branches of the International Islamic Relief Organization as fund-raisers for al Qaeda and other terror groups. It also designated one of the Saudi-based organization's high-ranking officials, Abd Al Hamid Sulaiman Al-Mujil, as a fund-raiser for al Qaeda. The action means that no American can have any dealings with the two branches of the organization or with Al-Mujil and that any assets they have in the United States will be frozen. "Al-Mujil has a long record of supporting Islamic militant groups, and he has maintained a cell...

<p>Cotabato City, 11 Sept. (AKI) - One of two top Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) members hiding in the southern Philippines province of Sulu, was reportedly killed by Filipino security forces, a spokesperson for the Muslim rebel groups in the south told Adnkronos International (AKI) on Monday. Eid Kabalu, spokesperson of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), said that their forces in the town of Jolo, some 590 miles south of Manila, have received information that one of two JI militants was killed in last week's offensive by the Philippine Army and Marines in the nearby town of Patikul.</p>

At least 30 Abu Sayyaf militants were killed by soldiers in fierce fighting in the southern island of Jolo, where security forces are tracking down two Jemaah Islamiya terrorists blamed for the 2002 Bali bombings, the military said Tuesday. Army Major General Eugenio Cedo, regional military commander, said troops were pursuing an estimated 100 Abu Sayyaf militants who broke into smaller groups in the hinterland of Patikul town, where six soldiers were killed and 19 others were wounded on Monday. "There is pursuit operation and we will not relent until the terrorists are neutralized," Cedo said. The bodies of six...

JI will share N-technology when in power: Prof Khurshid Daily Times Monitor LAHORE: The Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) will share nuclear technology with countries which need it if it comes to power, JI deputy chief Prof Khurshid Ahmad said on Geo television’s Jwabdeh programme on Sunday. He said that all options including transfer of nuclear technology should remain open, adding that Article 3 of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) stressed that the countries having nuclear technology should share it with those which didn’t have it. “According to the NPT, it is the responsibility of every country having nuclear technology to share it with...

WITHIN two years of Abu Bakar Bashir's last clandestine visit to Australia, terror suspect Jack Thomas had met and married - within a day - a close friend of the cleric's wife and was meeting with senior figures in the terrorist network Jemaah Islamiah. Thomas's new wife, Indonesian-born Maryati Idris, was central to introducing him to the organisation that has been blamed for a series of terrorist attacks including the two Bali bombings. Through these connections he was also introduced to the mysterious Indonesian twin brothers - Abdul Rahim Ayub and Abdul Rahman Ayub - who were entrusted with setting...

The military believed that plans by the Abu Sayyaf to conduct bombings in the country were averted with the discovery of the biggest camp of the group in Jolo, Sulu, ABS-CBN News reported Friday. An exclusive report of late night newscast Bandila said that as early as July, the military had already planned to raid the camp of the Abu Sayyaf in the jungles of Jolo after receiving information from residents living nearby. The camp was being used as training ground for Abu Sayyaf members and was once the hiding place of leaders Abu Sulayman, Khadaffy Janjalani and Radulan...

The government assured the United States, Australia and Indonesia yesterday that it would not let elusive Abu Sayyaf leader Khadaffy Janjalani and his two Jemaah Islamiyah cohorts, who are wanted for the 2002 Bali bombings, escape a military dragnet in Sulu. A civilian was killed and five soldiers were wounded in clashes outside the town of Indanan in Sulu as government troops pursued Abu Sayyaf rebels and several Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) militants who have joined forces in Mindanao, military officials said. The officials said at least three Abu Sayyaf rebels were killed and two others wounded as the military launched...

CANBERRA: The first arrest made under Australia's new anti-terrorism laws, in fact the first Australian since 1978 to be charged with terrorism is a Pakistan-born medical student who allegedly attended a three-week training camp organised by the Lashkar-e-Toiba in Pakistan in January last year. Sydney resident Izhar Ul-Haque was arrested by the Australian Federal Police on April 15 and although he was released on bail on May 27, he is said to be under close observation. His lawyer has denied he was a terrorist but admitted that Ul-Haque was sympathetic to the “Kashmir cause''. Ul-Haque is said to have claimed...

Target any white person: the chilling guidelines for Bali suicide bombers By Anton La Guardia, Diplomatic Editor (Filed: 04/07/2006) Any white person is a target. Avoid hotels because they are too well protected. Carry the bombs in small knapsacks to avoid suspicion. And don't worry about your escape route because you will become a "martyr". These guidelines for suicide bombers were found on a computer captured by Indonesian police during a raid in November, and are believed to have been written by the British-educated bomb-maker Azahari Husin, who died during the attack. Azahari, in his mid-40s when he died, studied...

JAKARTA, Indonesia, July 2 — The bombs should be small and placed in day packs, making them harder to detect. The bombers should dress like tourists. They should not bother targeting hotels because security is too tight. Instead they should consider restaurants, discos and theaters. A police officer searched the site of one of the bombings in Bali on Oct. 2, 2005. The blasts killed 20 people. A thorough survey should be done in advance by the bombers themselves. That way, they are more familiar with the sites, and no one is left behind to be hunted later by the...

How [radical] Islam makes one into a fascist, whether you are Arab, black, etc. The broader view of the deep & wide reality of Islamofascism What do the Arab Muslim massacre in NYC WTC, The Pakistani Muslim bombing in London, the Arab Muslim bombing in Madrid, an Indonesian attack on Australians in Bali, an Arab Muslim racist attack on an ordinary Jew in Paris, Arabs' onslaught in the genocide campaign in Sudan, WW2's Bosnian Muslims attacking Christian Serbs, Jordanian Arab murderer: Zarqawi that seperated (Nazi style) between Shiite & Sunni kids on a bus, Arab slave masters in Mauritania, a...

The Malaysian government recently announced that between March 16 and April 3 they had arrested 12 individuals who were part of the Darul Islam (DI) organization; authorities allege that they were planning a string of bombings (The Star, May 31). The Malaysian authorities went to great lengths to insist that the 12 individuals—three or four Indonesians, two Filipinos and six Malaysians—were neither members of Jemaah Islamiya (JI) nor the Kumpulan Mujahidin Malaysia (KMM) [1]. DI was founded in 1947 by Sekarmadji Maridjan Kartosuwiryo and its espoused goal was to establish an Islamic state in Indonesia (Negara Islam Indonesia). To that...