Hambali captured in Thailand, handed over to US
BANGKOK, Aug 15: Hambali, a key Al Qaeda operative and the suspected mastermind behind a string of deadly bombings, has been captured in Thailand, handed over to the US authorities and flown out of the country , officials said on Friday.
Asia's most wanted man, now clean-shaven, was arrested with a woman by Thai and US officials in Ayutthaya, the ancient Thai capital 80km north of Bangkok, a senior Thai general said.
"A special flight from the United States picked him up at Bangkok airport on Wednesday morning," said the general, who declined to be identified.
Confusion surrounded the whereabouts of the Al Qaeda-linked radical to be hunted down in the war on terror that Washington launched after the Sept 11, 2001, attacks.
Hambali, born Riduan Isamuddin, and his wife were flown home to Indonesia, a Thai government minister said. Indonesia's police chief said he was unaware of the transfer, and a US official in Bangkok said Washington was unlikely to reveal his location soon.
Hambali is wanted in Indonesia as the suspected planner of many attacks across the archipelago, including last October's Bali bombings which killed 202 people in two nightclubs.
Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said Hambali's arrest followed local leads, but would not say where he had been taken. "We received tipoffs from local people that there were strange-looking people staying around there so we checked their background and passports and realized that they were the people we were looking for," he told reporters in Sri Lanka.
Hambali, identified as a cleric and son of a peasant belonging to the Indonesian island of Java, crossed into Thailand last week from Laos using a fake Spanish passport, a police general said.
"He was not wearing a beard and he had had plastic surgery," he said. "He used a Spanish passport with a long, confusing Spanish name."
INTERROGATION STARTS: US officials said Hambali, thought to be operations chief of Southeast Asia's Jemaah Islamiyah network and the only man from the region to sit on Al Qaeda's military committee, was being interrogated but would not say where.
"Hambali is in US custody and that's all we can say for now," said a US diplomat in Bangkok. Governments across Asia and in Australia breathed sighs of relief at the capture of a man tagged one of the world's most dangerous. He had been on the run since at least 2000. However, officials said they feared that JI might strike again - little more than a week after a suicide car-bomber killed 12 people at a luxury Jakarta hotel - in revenge for Hambali's capture.
"We should not let our guard down," Philippine National Security Adviser Roilo Golez told Reuters. "We have to raise the alert level against repercussions or retaliatory attacks."
Australia said the arrest of Hambali, who is about 40, was a major breakthrough in the US-led war on terror. Indonesia called it "an important mark in the global fight against terror".
Hambali was also sighted in neighbouring Cambodia, but had managed to stay one step ahead of the law. Singapore said Hambali's arrest was significant but did not alter the risk of terror attacks on the city state, which is already very high.
"It is highly significant (the arrest) as it removes one of the key leaders of the terrorist network. But the threat of terrorism is not over yet, as there are other Jemaah Islamiyah operatives still on the run or who have not surfaced," said Wong Kan Seng, minister of home affairs.-Reuters
Our Washington Correspondent adds: Hambali's capture's is considered so important by the US authorities that President George W. Bush personally announced it in a televised address on Friday evening. Mr Bush said US agencies had captured "one of the world's most lethal terrorists".
"He's a known killer, who was a close associate of Sept 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed," Mr Bush said of Hambali. "He is no longer a problem to those of us who love freedom," the US president told an audience of military personnel and their families at the Miramar Marine Corps Air Station in California.
"It was an undercover operation ... (involving) significant manpower," and more than one US agency, one official said. "It's a huge catch, he was the third-most-wanted terrorist in the world," behind Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri, added the official.
A senior administration official said the operation was conducted with the help of other governments that he would not identify.
Hambali, the senior administration official said, had "facilitated" a January 2000 meeting in Kuala Lumpur which is thought to have been the first step in planning the Sept 11, 2001, attacks. The meeting was attended by two of the hijackers. He said Hambali was Al Qaeda's "chief representative in Southeast Asia."
He said information received from "a senior Al Qaeda detainee and corroborated by other sources" showed that "shortly after Sept 11," Hambali had been "tasked" by Al Qaeda to recruit pilots to participate in additional hijackings inside the United States.
The official added that the same sources indicated "an Al Qaeda leader in Pakistan earlier this year provided Hambali a large sum of money for a major attack." |
