| Submit your comments on this article |
| Southeast Asia |
| Bashir front group signs anti-terrorism declaration |
| 2005-09-13 |
| The Indonesian Mujahadeen Council (MMI), a radical Islamic group founded in 1999 by Abu Bakar Bashir - a controversial imam who was sentenced to two and half years in prison for his involvement in the 2002 Bali bombings, which killed 202 people - has signed an anti-terrorism declaration. The document, signed on the 11 September in remembrance of the 9/11's victims, was also signed by Indonesian key figures of other religions - Catholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism, Hinduism and Confucianism. Bashir was born on 17 August 1938, in East Java's Jombang city, from a family of Yemeni descent. In 1979 he was jailed under former president Suharto for his political activity aimed at establishing an Islamic state in South East Asia. In 1985, he escaped to Malaysia and returned in 1999, a year after Suharto's downfall. On his return in Indonesia, Bakir founded the MMI, which favours the application of the Sharia - Muslim law- in the country. The organisation has, according to security experts, close links with al-Qaeda and other terrorist organisations. Bakir is also considered the spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiyah, the terrorist group, which while not being outlawed in Indonesia, is accused of orchestrating the bombings in Bali (2002) and Jakarta (2003) - carried out against the Marriot hotel and the Australian embassy - which claimed a total of 225 lives. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |