The official did not say when or where Umar Patek was
arrested, but according to the Philippines Army, who has also been hunting him,
he was seized on Jan. 25 along with a Pakistani associate believed to have been
giving him shelter.
The arrest of Patek, who has a $1 million American price on
his head, is a major victory in the global fight against Al-Qaeda and — since
he was taken alive — could provide very valuable intelligence about regional
militant networks and possible future plots.
Indonesia’s top police detective, Lt. General Ito Sumardi,
said he only received a report of Patek’s arrest a few days ago and was sending
teams to Islamabad to identify him.
Questions remain over how he got to Pakistan, which remains
a magnet for foreign militants seeking contact with Al-Qaeda leaders in the
country especially in the northwest territories close to the Afghan border.
Sumardi said he was concerned over how Patek was able to
travel across international borders to get here.
Patek, 40, is well-known to intelligence agencies across the
world and is believed to have served as the deputy field commander of Jemaah
Islamiyah, the Indonesian Al-Qaeda affiliate that carried out the Bali
nightclub bombings that left 202 people dead, including 88 Australians and
seven Americans.
He’s also suspected in at least two other suicide bombings
in Jakarta in 2003 and 2009.
Patek spent time in Afghanistan and Pakistan in the 1980s
and 1990s with about 300 other Southeast Asian militants and together they
formed the nucleus of Jemaah Islamiyah.
Since 2002, however, Indonesia has rounded up or killed many
top militants and he was one of the most senior members of the group still on
the run.
News of his arrest initially came from intelligence officials
in Indonesia and the Philippines on Tuesday. On Wednesday, a Pakistani
intelligence official confirmed the capture, but declined to give any further
information. All spoke on customary condition of anonymity.
The officer said Patek was currently being questioned by
Pakistani agents.
“It is our policy to send them back to their country of
origin. We will eventually give him to the Indonesians,” he said.
After the 9/11 attacks, Pakistan is known to have detained a
significant number of foreign Al-Qaeda operatives and secretly sent them to the
United States, where many were detained in Guantanamo. The CIA, which still
cooperates closely with Pakistan intelligence agencies, would presumably like
to have access to Patek, but the Pakistani officer said this would happen only
with the consent of Indonesia, which too has worked closely with the United
States in the past.
One of Patek’s suspected coconspirators in the nightclub
bombing, known as Hambali, was arrested in Thailand in 2003 and sent to the
United States, where he is now being held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
His detention was a for a long time a source of tension
between Washington and Jakarta, which wanted him tried in Indonesia. The
country has arrested, tried and convicted hundreds of militants in a widely
praised crackdown.
Asked about the arrest of Patek, US Ambassador to Indonesia
Scot A. Marciel said “as far as I know this is not a US government operation.
We did not arrest him, we do not have custody of this guy, so I’m not sure
there is a US government role in this.” Patek fled to the southern Philippines
after the Bali bombings, seeking refuge and training with both the Moro Islamic
Liberation Front, the largest Muslim separatist group, and later, the Al-Qaeda-linked
Abu Sayyaf, security experts have said.
Philippine military spokesman Miguel Jose said Patek’s
arrest would be “a big blow to Jemaah Islamiyah and of course the Abu Sayyaf
because they have a tactical alliance.” “Many in the region have heaved a sigh
of relief that he has been arrested,” he said.
Maj. Gen. Francisco Cruz, of the Philippine armed forces,
said “the threat from JI (Jemaah Islamiyah) in Mindanao has diminished because
of that.” In March 2010, Patek was believed to be in Sulu province in the far
southern Philippines. According to the Jamestown Foundation, a national
security policy institute in Washington, Patek was one of the “last senior JI
commanders with significant experience” in the original Afghan Al-Qaeda camps
and long-standing ties to the international jihadist network and its donors.
