National

National Police Chief: Police Have Been Passive in the Hunt for Bombing Suspects
Tuesday, 02 November, 2004 | 11:33 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta:National Police chief Gen. Da’i Bachtiar has said he considers the police in the regions have been mostly passive in the hunt for two alleged bombing masterminds Dr. Azahari and Noor Din M. Top.

Many of the police prefer to wait for reports to come in from the general publis rather than working in the field.

“Many police still prefer to wait passively in their offices,” said Bachtiar at the National Police headquarters (HQ) in Jakarta on Friday (29/10).

According to Bachtiar, if the police complain about the public’s slow reaction in delivering the reports on the two bombing suspects, this actually indicates that the police have been less active in their efforts.

With President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s order to arrest the two suspects during the first 100-days of the new administration, the police must be very active in their efforts to arrest the bombing suspects.

Bachtiar promised that he would add cars and motorcycles as police operational vehicles to improve the police’s mobility.

He would also add the police’s mobile team and order all police chiefs to mobilize the police offices in their areas.

“This way, the police will be more mobile and lessen their habit of staying at the offices,” stated Bachtiar.

He referred to the incident of the assembled-bomb blast in Cicurug, Sukabumi, West Java, on October 15, as an example of the police’s slow action.

In fact, if the police did not only rely on reports from the public in the hunt for bombing suspects, the persons who assembled the bomb--alleged to be members of Dr. Azahari’s network—could perhaps have been arrested.

Bachtiar stated that with all the changes he was making, he would work hard to reach the 100-day target ordered by the president in arresting bombing suspects Dr. Azahari and Noor Din M. Top.

“We have been very close to these two people. But, they still managed to escape,” he added.

Bachtiar said therefore that the police have stayed alert on bomb threats in the run-up to the Idul Fitri celebrations.

In Cicurug, the police had found bombs kept in a backpack in a rented house and thought these had been assembled Dr. Azahari had assembled the bombs as they were very complex.

“Moreover, the four people renting this house are yet to be arrested. They might have taken bombs with them,” stated Bachtiar.

However, he confirmed that the police had detected the whereabouts of Dr. Azahari and his group members.

“We’ve been very close to their whereabouts. We really hope that we can arrest them,” Bachtiar added. (Martha Warta Silaban-Tempo News Room)