Riduan Isamuddin | |
---|---|
Born | Encep Nurjaman April 4, 1964 [1] [2] [3] Cianjur, West Java, Indonesia |
Arrested | August 11, 2003 Ayutthaya, Thailand |
Detained at | CIA black sites, Guantanamo |
Other name(s) | Hambali Nurjaman |
ISN | 10019 |
Alleged to be a member of | Al-Qaeda Jemaah Islamiyah |
Charge(s) | Charged before a military commission in 2021 |
Riduan Isamuddin, [a] also known by the nom de guerre Hambali (born April 4, 1964), is the former military leader of the Indonesian terrorist organization Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). He is currently in American custody at Guantanamo Bay detainment camp in Cuba. [4] He is currently awaiting trial in a military commission. [5] [6]
Hambali was often described as "the Osama bin Laden of Southeast Asia". Some media reports describe him as bin Laden's lieutenant for Southeast Asian operations. Other reports describe him as an independent peer. He was highly trusted by al-Qaeda and was the main link between the two organisations. Hambali was a close friend of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who planned the Bojinka plot and the September 11 attacks. Hambali envisioned creating a Muslim state, in the form of an Islamic superpower (a theocracy) across Southeast Asia, with himself as its leader (Caliph). His ambition was to rule Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and parts of the Philippines, Myanmar, and Thailand. [7] [8]
He received increasing attention in the aftermath of the 2002 Bali bombings, in which 202 people died. [9] He was eventually apprehended in a joint operation by the CIA and Thai police in 2003. He is currently imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba, after three years of CIA custody in a secret location.
Riduan Isamuddin was born Encep Nurjaman in the rice belt of Sukamanah, a small village in Cianjur Regency, in the province of West Java, Indonesia. He was the son of a peasant farmer, and was the second of thirteen children. He first became involved with Jemaah Islamiah as a teenager. He was a diligent student at his Islamic high school, Al-Ianah. He travelled to Afghanistan in 1983 to fight the Soviet Union during the Soviet–Afghan War. During his three years as a mujahid, from 1987 to 1990, he met Osama bin Laden. Friends and family in Indonesia say they did not know of his activities overseas. [10]
His name has been transliterated into English text in several different ways over the years, including;
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(March 2009) |
In 1991, Nurjamin returned to Cianjur for one week, before going to Malaysia, where he met the two co-founders of JI, Abdullah Sungkar and Abubakar Bashir. The three lived in a housing compound in Kampung Sungai Manggis, Banting, Selangor. Nurjaman internationalized the terrorist group's activities and took on a new name in his permanent residence permit: Riduan Isamuddin. His nickname, Hambali, is an allusion to Hanbali, an Islamic school of jurisprudence.
The two co-founders sent their students to "study" in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The students actually fought the Soviets until the Soviets pulled out of Afghanistan. A woman named Noralwizah Lee Abdullah had gone to Malaysia for religious schooling. She secretly married Isamuddin after meeting him at the Luqmanul Hakiem School in Ulu Tiram, Johor. The school was founded by Sungkar and Bashir.
Initially, Isamuddin struggled to make a living for his family. He switched from selling kebabs to patenting medicines. He soon disappeared from his home for weeks at a time, and he received many visitors at home. He eventually came to own a red hatchback and several cell phones. Investigators say that many calls on those cell phones were made to Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, Osama bin Laden's brother in law, who had arrived back in Manila, Philippines in 1991.
After Arab visitors gave his family much money, he founded a shell company, Konsojaya, in June 1994. Ostensibly an import-export company trading in palm oil between Malaysia and Afghanistan, it was essentially a front company for terrorism.[ citation needed ] Wali Khan Amin Shah, who would become the financier of Operation Bojinka, was a director of Konsojaya. The company provided financial assistance to the project until it was discovered by investigators on a laptop computer after an apartment fire on January 6, 1995. Shah was arrested in the Philippines but escaped on a short order. Shah was arrested in Malaysia in December 1995. Both Shah and mastermind Ramzi Yousef, who escaped the Philippines but was arrested in Lahore, Pakistan, were extradited to the United States. They were both convicted and sentenced to life in prison for participating in the project.
Hambali's company attracted attention of investigators so his dealings went quiet for a while.[ citation needed ] He decided to preach, raise money, and recruit for his cause. He went underground in 2000 and started a wave of church-bombings in Indonesia. He always had a "hands-on" technique; he met his foot soldiers and came to them "with detailed plans, plenty of cash and two of his own bombmakers." He always fled before the bombing commenced. Meanwhile, the spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiah, Abu Bakr Bashir, was preaching jihad at his schools while denying links to Islamic militants.[ citation needed ]
Hambali planned and attended the January 2000 Al Qaeda Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Among the others present were two 9/11 hijackers, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi. This gathering in Kuala Lumpur was observed by the CIA and Malaysian authorities, but what specifically was being said at the meetings was not picked up. Hambali also provided money and documents to Zacarias Moussaoui in October of that year. However claims by Singaporean security analyst Rohan Gunaratna that he had flown to Australia were dismissed by Australian authorities. [15]
After the 2002 Bali bombings, in which 202 people were killed, Hambali received more attention from the United States. In the years leading up to the attack, the Indonesian government's action against Islamic militants had been minimal. Following the attack, Abu Bakr Bashir was arrested as part of a crack down on Jemaah Islamiah. He was wanted in Indonesia [16] for the bombings of several churches in the region, and wanted for the Bali bombings and a failed plot on several targets in Singapore.
Hambali used a series of safe-houses throughout Southeast Asia, especially Thailand and Cambodia, to move around. While he was in Ayutthaya, Thailand, 75 kilometres north of Bangkok, he was planning a terrorist attack against several Thai hotels and the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit (APEC) in Bangkok in October 2003. Hambali had used a false Spanish passport to enter Thailand while his wife used her Malaysian passport.
Thai police found him as part of a joint operation between the Thai police and the CIA on August 11, 2003. [17] [18] The twenty uniformed and undercover police smashed down the door to his one bedroom apartment in Ayutthaya, and arrested him and 33-year-old Noralwizah Lee Abdullah, a Chinese Malaysian who was considered to be his wife. Hambali was wearing a pair of jeans, a T-shirt, a baseball cap, and a pair of sunglasses. Police also seized explosives and firearms in the property. It marked the end of a 20-month hunt for Hambali, who was 37 years of age when he was captured.
According to a 2010 Associated Press report, by March 2004 Hambali was being held at a CIA black site in Rabat, Morocco, and by October of that year he had been transferred to a black site in Bucharest, Romania. [19] On September 6, 2006, President George W. Bush confirmed that Hambali was being held by the CIA and revealed that he had been transferred to Guantanamo Bay. [20] His wife is now in Malaysian custody.
On September 8, 2006, Indonesia formally requested access to Hambali to ensure a fair trial. [21]
Hambali is also wanted in the Philippines for the transfer of explosives on Filipino soil in an attempt to transport them to Singapore.
Following his capture the USA would not confirm or deny that he was in their custody. But on September 6, 2006, President George W. Bush acknowledged [22] the existence of covert, overseas CIA interrogation centres (colloquially known as black sites) and announced that 14 high-profile members (al Qaeda and other related groups) had been transported from those sites to Guantanamo Bay. [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] Those 14 include Hambali and an alleged lieutenant of his called Mohammed Nazir Bin Lep alias Lillie or Li-Li.
On August 11, 2003, the United States government subjected Hambali to almost three years of isolation, interrogation and torture. [23] [24] [25] [26] Within days of his arrest, he was taken to an undisclosed secret detention facility where he was subject to "enhanced interrogation techniques" (EITs) inflicted by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for approximately three years as part of the notorious Rendition, Detention and Interrogation (RDI) program, which is now commonly known as the "Torture Program."
But a complete description of his torture as well as the locations in which it occurred remained classified by the United States government. [23] [24] [25] [26] Only limited amounts of information describing his torture have been released - first from the International Committee of the Red Cross Report on the Treatment of Fourteen 'High-Value Detainees' in CIA Custody dated February 2007 and later by the SSCI Report in 2014.
According to the 2014 Senate Intelligence Committee report, Hambali was told by an interrogator that he would never go to court: "We can never let the world know what I have done to you." [23] [24] [25] [26] [28]
The Bush administration asserted that:
the protections of the Geneva Conventions did not extend to captured prisoners who are not members of the regular Afghan armed force nor meet the criteria for prisoner of war for voluntary forces. [29]
Critics argued the Conventions obliged the U.S. to conduct competent tribunals to determine the status of prisoners. Subsequently, the U.S. Department of Defense instituted Combatant Status Review Tribunals (CSRTs), to determine whether detainees met the new definition of an "enemy combatant".
"Enemy combatant" was defined by the U.S. Department of Defense as:
an individual who was part of, or supporting, the Taliban, or al-Qaeda forces, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners. This includes any person who commits a belligerent act or has directly supported hostilities in aid of enemy armed forces. [30]
The CSRTs are not bound by the rules of evidence that would normally apply in civilian court, and the government’s evidence is presumed to be “genuine and accurate.” [31] From July 2004 through March 2005, CSRTs were convened to determine whether each prisoner had been correctly classified as an "enemy combatant".
Riduan Isamuddin was among the 60% of prisoners who chose to participate in tribunal hearings. [32] A Summary of Evidence memo was prepared for the tribunal of each detainee, listing the allegations that supported their detention as an "enemy combatant".
Riduan Isamuddin's memo accused him of the following: [33]
The Department of Defense announced on August 9, 2007 that all fourteen of the "high-value detainees" who had been transferred to Guantanamo from the CIA's black sites, had been officially classified as "enemy combatants". [34] Although judges Peter Brownback and Keith J. Allred had ruled two months earlier that only "illegal enemy combatants" could face military commissions, the Department of Defense waived the qualifier and said that all fourteen men could now face charges before Guantanamo military commissions. [35] [36]
According to Xinhua, the state-owned newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party, the Department of Justice was considering transferring Riduan Isamuddin to Washington, D.C. for a civilian trial. [37]
When he assumed office in January 2009, President Barack Obama made a number of promises about the future of Guantanamo. [38] [39] [40] He promised the use of torture would cease at the camp. He promised to institute a new review system. That new review system was composed of officials from six departments, where the OARDEC reviews were conducted entirely by the Department of Defense. When it reported back, a year later, the Joint Review Task Force classified some individuals as too dangerous to be transferred from Guantanamo, even though there was no evidence to justify laying charges against them. On April 9, 2013, that document was made public after a Freedom of Information Act request. [41] Riduan Isamuddin was one of the 71 individuals deemed too innocent to charge, but too dangerous to release. Although Obama promised that those deemed too innocent to charge, but too dangerous to release would start to receive reviews from a Periodic Review Board as less than a quarter of men have received a review. Isamuddin was denied approval for transfer on September 19, 2016. [42]
Some of the above information about Hambali, and more, can be read in the report [13] of the 9-11 Commission.
Abu Zubaydah is a Palestinian citizen born in Saudi Arabia currently held by the U.S. in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba. He is held under the authority of Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF).
Jemaah Islamiyah was a Southeast Asian Islamist militant group based in Indonesia, which was dedicated to the establishment of an Islamic state in Southeast Asia. On 25 October 2002, immediately following the JI-perpetrated 2002 Bali bombings, JI was added to the UN Security Council Resolution 1267.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, often known by his initials KSM, is a Pakistani terrorist, mechanical engineer and the former Head of Propaganda for the pan-Islamist militant group al-Qaeda. He is currently held by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp under terrorism-related charges. He was named as "the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks" in the 2004 9/11 Commission Report.
The Singapore embassies attack plot was a plan in 2001 by Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) to bomb the diplomatic missions and attack personnel of the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Israel based in Singapore. There were also several other targets. The plot was uncovered in December 2001 and as many as 15 people were arrested in Singapore within a month. Further investigation and intelligence prompted the detention of another 26 persons from 2002 to 2005. As of 2006, 37 of them were still being detained without trial, under the Internal Security Act. Four had been released on restriction orders.
Walid Muhammad Salih bin Mubarak bin Attash is a Yemeni prisoner held at the United States' Guantanamo Bay detention camp under terrorism-related charges and is suspected of playing a key role in the early stages of the 9/11 attacks. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has described him as a "scion of a terrorist family". American prosecutors at the Guantanamo military commissions allege that he helped in the preparation of the 1998 East Africa Embassy bombings and the USS Cole bombing and acted as a bodyguard to Osama bin Laden, gaining himself the reputation of an "errand boy". He is formally charged with selecting and helping to train several of the hijackers of the September 11 attacks. On 31 July 2024, Attash agreed to plead guilty to avoid the death penalty. His plea deal was revoked by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin two days later.
Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani is a Tanzanian conspirator of the al-Qaeda terrorist organization convicted for his role in the bombing of embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. He was indicted in the United States as a participant in the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings. He was on the FBI Most Wanted Terrorists list from its inception in October 2001. In 2004, he was captured and detained by Pakistani forces in a joint operation with the United States, and was held until June 9, 2009, at Guantanamo Bay detention camp; one of 14 Guantanamo detainees who had previously been held at secret locations abroad. According to The Washington Post, Ghailani told military officers he is contrite and claimed to be an exploited victim of al-Qaeda operatives.
Ammar al-Balushi or Amar Baloch; born Ali Abdul Aziz Ali on 29 August 1977) is a Pakistani (Balochi) citizen who has been in American custody at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp since 2006. He was arrested in the Pakistani city of Karachi in 2003 before being transferred; the series of criminal charges against him include: "facilitating the 9/11 attackers, acting as a courier for Osama bin Laden and plotting to crash a plane packed with explosives into the U.S. consulate in Karachi." He is a nephew of the Pakistani terrorist Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who served as a senior official of al-Qaeda between the late 1980s and early 2000s; and a cousin of the Pakistani terrorist Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, who played a key role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the Philippine Airlines Flight 434 bombing, and the high-profile Bojinka plot.
Mustafa Ahmed Adam al-Hawsawi is a Saudi Arabian citizen. He is alleged to have acted as a key financial facilitator for the September 11 attacks in the United States.
Abdul Rahim Hussein Muhammed Abdu al-Nashiri is a Saudi Arabian citizen alleged to be the mastermind of the bombing of USS Cole and other maritime attacks. He is alleged to have headed al-Qaeda operations in the Persian Gulf and the Gulf states prior to his capture in November 2002 by the CIA's Special Activities Division.
A suicide bomber detonated a car bomb outside the lobby of the JW Marriott Jakarta hotel on 5 August 2003, killing 12 people and injuring 150. Those killed included 11 Indonesians and one Dutch national. The hotel was viewed as a Western symbol, and had been used by the United States embassy for various events. The hotel was closed for five weeks and reopened to the public on 8 September 2003.
Extrajudicial prisoners of the United States, in the context of the early twenty-first century War on Terrorism, refers to foreign nationals the United States detains outside of the legal process required within United States legal jurisdiction. In this context, the U.S. government is maintaining torture centers, called black sites, operated by both known and secret intelligence agencies. Such black sites were later confirmed by reports from journalists, investigations, and from men who had been imprisoned and tortured there, and later released after being tortured until the CIA was comfortable they had done nothing wrong, and had nothing to hide.
Mohammed Farik Bin Amin, alias Zubair Zaid, is a Malaysian who is alleged to be a senior member of Jemaah Islamiyah and al Qaeda. He is currently in American custody in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. He is one of the 14 detainees who had previously been held for years at CIA black sites. In the ODNI biographies of those 14, Amin is described as a direct subordinate of Hambali. Farik Amin is also a cousin of well-known Malaysian terrorist Zulkifli Abdhir.
Hammdidullah, a.k.a.Janat Gul, is a citizen of Afghanistan who was held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camp, in Cuba. American counter-terror analysts estimate he was born in 1973, in Sarpolad, Afghanistan.
Fathur Rahman al-Ghozi was a key operative and bomb-maker of the Islamic militant Jemaah Islamiya group (JI). Al-Ghozi was accused of plotting and carrying out several terrorist attacks in the Philippines, Indonesia, and Singapore.
Sharqawi Abdu Ali al-Hajj, also known as Riyadh the Facilitator, is a Yemeni alleged Al-Qaeda associate who is currently being held in the United States' Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba. He is accused of being a "senior al-Qaida facilitator who swore an oath of allegiance to and personally recruited bodyguards for Osama Bin Laden".
Mohammed Nazir Bin Lep is a Malaysian national alleged to be affiliated with Jemaah Islamiyah and al-Qaeda, currently in American DoD custody in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. He is one of 119 detainees previously held at secret Black Sites abroad, which included being subjected to Enhanced Interrogation Techniques. In the ODNI biographies, Bin Lep is described as a high value detainee and lieutenant of Hambali . He was transferred from clandestine custody to the Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba, on September 6, 2006.
Huda bin Abdul Haq was an Indonesian terrorist who was convicted and executed for his role in coordinating the Christmas Eve 2000 Indonesia bombings and 2002 Bali bombings. Mukhlas was a senior and influential Jemaah Islamiyah leader with ties to Osama bin Laden.
Muhammad Rahim is an Afghan national who is held in captivity by the United States Government at Guantanamo Bay. He was born in eastern Afghanistan. Muhammad Rahim worked for an Afghan government committee that worked to eliminate opium poppies from the nation. He was forced to leave his job by the Taliban. In 1979, Rahim fled Afghanistan with his brother over the border of Pakistan. Their departure was triggered by the Soviet Union invasion into Afghanistan.
The United States Department of Defense acknowledges holding two Indonesian detainees in Guantanamo. A total of 778 detainees have been held in extrajudicial detention in the Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba since the camps opened on January 11, 2002, The camp population peaked in 2004 at approximately 660. Only nineteen new detainees, all "high value detainees" have been transferred there since the United States Supreme Court's ruling in Rasul v. Bush. As of September 2009 the camp population stands at approximately 223.
Following the September 11 attacks of 2001 and subsequent War on Terror, the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) established a "Detention and Interrogation Program" that included a network of clandestine extrajudicial detention centers, officially known as "black sites", to detain, interrogate, and often torture suspected enemy combatants, usually with the acquiescence, if not direct collaboration, of the host government.
This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations .(February 2008) |
The main financier of the operation is alleged to have been Riduan Isamuddin, also known as Hambali, and now purported to be al Qaeda's main operative in Southeast Asia.
In Malaysia, Bashir began to surround himself with a hard-core of militants. One of these was Hambali, alias Riduan Isamuddin, a 37-year-old Indonesian who fought against the Soviets. Today, he is described by Western sources as the chief operations officer of JI, and is reputedly the mastermind of al Qaeda cells in this part of the world.
{{cite web}}
: Cite uses generic title (help)Top secret cables, now declassified, revealed the torture of Hambali began one month after his capture.
Hambali was one of eight key examples given by the agency to justify the success of "enhanced interrogation" techniques.
It was at this point that Hambali entered CIA custody, and was, according to CIA records cited by the SSCI report, almost immediately subjected to "enhanced interrogation techniques". There are no declassified records detailing the torture of Hambali, although there are cables recording the fact that he later recanted the information he provided under torture, which he gave "in an attempt to reduce the pressure on himself... and to give an account that was consistent with what he assessed the questioners wanted to hear."
{{cite news}}
: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)