September 24, 2024
JAKARTA – Former members of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) in the region should take their cue from the organisation’s recent dissolution and look to reintegrate themselves into society, said Para Wijayanto, the former leader of the now-defunct terror group.
“We hope that (all former) members can support this decision of JI disbanding and reintegrate themselves so that they can become good citizens of their own countries,” said the 60-year-old, who was JI’s chief up till his 2019 capture and subsequent incarceration.
During an interview with The Straits Times on Sept 23 in Jakarta, Wijayanto said the regional group’s dissolution was motivated by a deeper understanding of Islamic teachings.
“We are steadfast in our piety, it’s just that we have done more in-depth research about Islam,” he said, adding that as long as a country respects Islam and the right of Muslims to practise their religion, then it should not be seen as a target.
“The world now has changed. Countries may not be Islamic, but they do not impede Islam, and so these are friendly countries.”
Formed in 1993, JI was the South-east Asian affiliate of Islamist militant organisation Al-Qaeda.
The group aimed to establish a conservative Islamic state in South-east Asia. After its co-founder Abdullah Sungkar’s death in 1999, its leadership transferred to several others before Wijayanto was named its emir, or top leader, in 2009.
Wijayanto held on to the position until 2019, when he was arrested along with his wife on the outskirts of Jakarta. He was sentenced to seven years’ jail in July 2020.
JI’s shift in perspective marks a distinct change from its radical approach of yesteryear, which led to violent attacks in the region that resulted in hundreds of deaths.
The group was outlawed in 2008 after deadly attacks in the Philippines and Indonesia, including the bombings on the holiday island of Bali in 2002 that killed more than 200 people, many of them Australian tourists.
The clandestine group, which had had a presence in Singapore since the late 1980s, was also responsible for the Republic’s closest shave with terrorism.
In late 2001, the country’s Internal Security Department (ISD) uncovered plots by the group to bomb multiple targets here, including several embassies, Changi Airport, Yishun MRT station and water pipelines. The plans were foiled, however, when members were arrested during the ISD’s crackdown on the JI network in 2001 and 2002.
Since then, more than 50 JI members have been detained by the Singapore authorities, and the network has been neutralised.
Many of them have been rehabilitated, but a few remain in detention in Singapore under the Internal Security Act, including JI leaders Ibrahim Maidin and Mas Selamat Kastari.
Mas Selamat, who gained notoriety when he escaped from detention in Singapore in 2008, was recaptured the following year and has been detained in the Republic since 2010. Ibrahim, a self-taught religious teacher who had undergone military training in Afghanistan, has been detained since 2002.
The group’s operations had always been clandestine, and full details of its structure and organisation were unknown, even to the authorities.
Other notable JI figures in Indonesia were Abu Rusdan, a militant cleric and former JI leader who was arrested in 2021 and is currently incarcerated, and Mukhlas, who was executed by a firing squad in 2008 for his involvement in the 2002 Bali bombings.
When asked about JI’s decision to disband, which was announced publicly by several key leaders on June 30, Wijayanto said it was spurred by a closer look at Islamic teachings, as well as the words and actions of Prophet Muhammad.
He said: “The dissolution of JI was based on knowledge… which changed our previous point of view. We found a number of lessons that had never crossed our minds before, and so we want to convey that with our disbandment.”
He called on former JI members to let go of their extremist beliefs and strive to be good citizens of their respective countries, and urged them to surrender their weapons to the authorities.
Some former senior leaders of JI, including Rusdan and Wijayanto, took part in a nationwide outreach tour earlier in September aimed at ensuring that former members do not regroup or join existing splinter groups. Wijayanto also called on his former comrades to contribute to peace and economic development in Indonesia.
When asked if he had any regrets over JI’s terrorist activities, especially under his leadership, Wijayanto said he did.
“Extremism, terrorism, radicalism and violence. We (JI) did all that, killing innocent lives.
“We would like to apologise to the victims, and to the families of the victims. We accept all the responsibility for our past actions, and we hope the cycle stops with us, instead of repeating itself,” he said.
Despite JI’s dissolution and the reassurances by its former leaders like Wijayanto, terrorism in the region remains a threat that requires constant vigilance, said Mr Jasminder Singh, an associate research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies.
“We’re barely a few months into JI’s dissolution. While it’s a positive step that there’s a shift towards non-violence, we cannot be complacent.
“We need to stock-take and see if this is a message that continues to resonate even in the future, especially when we consider that the orders are given by those in custody. There are still many of them out there, and we don’t know if they will fall in line,” he told ST.
In its annual report on terrorism released on July 25, Singapore’s ISD said the terrorism threat in the country has increased since the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023, which has ignited emotive responses worldwide, including acts of violence and calls by terrorist groups to further their agenda.
The report also stated that while Indonesia did not suffer any terror attacks in 2023, the authorities arrested close to 150 individuals in counter-terrorism operations that year, showing how terrorism is still a threat.
Rather than fixate on the progress JI has made, Mr Singh said, a forward-looking approach needs to be the way ahead, especially with other terror groups already having a presence in other parts of South-east Asia.
“Singapore is probably the only country in South-east Asia that has not been rocked by a terror attack, and so we need to remain vigilant regardless,” he added.