Bangkok Post (Thailand)
Next Friday, 11 August, marks the 3rd anniversary of the arrest of alleged terrorist Hambali in the Thai province of Ayutthaya. The White House welcomed his capture as 'an important victory in the war on terrorism,' and $10 million in reward was later handed to the Thai government. SONGPOL KAOPATUMTIP and MAXMILIAN WECHSLER investigated the events that led to a five-month-long hunt for one of the world's most wanted terrorist suspects in 2003.
It was a hot afternoon in mid-March 2003. Inside a Police Special Branch (SB) office in Bangkok, a senior officer was sifting through his "top secret" file when his mobile phone rang. "My friend, we just got information that Hambali and his wife have left for Thailand," said the voice at the other end of the line. The caller was a Cambodian intelligence officer, who had been on the hunt for the alleged terrorist leader for a month.
Earlier in Phnom Penh, Cambodian police had arrested several Islamic teachers and extracted crucial information about Hambali and his Chinese Malaysian wife, Noralwizah Lee Abdullah. Word about the presence of the pair put the SB officer's unit on "red alert".
"My hunch was that Hambali was planning a big operation here," the officer told Perspective. Bangkok was then preparing for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit, which would be attended by 21 world leaders, including US President George W. Bush, in October 2003.
A "war room" was set up, and a nationwide hunt for Hambali - later code-named "Operation Black Magic" - began.
"Everyone was very tense because Hambali was allegedly linked to various bombings that killed some 300 people. He was the most wanted fugitive in the region and was closely linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda movement," said the officer.
"It was confirmed that he organised a meeting for two of 9/11 hijackers when they visited Kuala Lumpur in 2000," he said, adding that Hambali's planned terrorist attacks in Singapore were thwarted in 2001.
Hambali is also believed to have masterminded the Christmas Eve bombings in 2000 in Indonesia (19 dead, 47 wounded), the bombing on September 30, 2000 in metro Manila, the Philippines (22 dead), the Bali attacks on October 12, 2002 (202 dead, more than 330 wounded), and possibly the J.W. Marriot Hotel bombing on August 5, 2003 in Jakarta (12 dead, over 150 wounded).
With the arrest of Hambali in Ayutthaya province on 11 August 2003, the officer believes that a series of major terrorist attacks planned for that year in Bangkok had been averted.
FROM MAE SAI TO AYUTTHAYA
Following the tip-off from Phnom Penh, Thai officers began interrogating several local and foreign Muslims apprehended in and around Bangkok. One of them confirmed that Hambali had entered Thailand from Cambodia.
"The last foreigner we interrogated gave us the name of Hambali's trusted aide. He also told us that Hambali was holding a Spanish passport bought from a pair of Pakistani forgers living in Thailand, who were linked to a Russian-born criminal whom we arrested later," said an officer in charge of the interrogation. "However, none of them knew Hambali's whereabouts, which we learned three days before his arrest."
After locating Hambali's aide, Thai police in early August followed him to the immigration checkpoint in Mae Sai district of the northern province of Chiang Rai. After making a visa extension for Hambali, his aide took a bus back to Bangkok. "We pounced on him at Ekkamai bus station, when he started to run," said the officer.
The police seized from him two passports - one was his own and the other belonged to Hambali, bearing the name of "Daniel Suarez Naviera." This Spanish passport wasn't a fake one as claimed by media reports. It was stolen from its owner, whose photo was replaced with Hambali's.
More importantly, they found on him a room key with the name tag of Boonyarak apartment in Ayutthaya province, 75 kilometres north of Bangkok. The police checked the list of all tenants and found that a man they believed to be Hambali was renting Room 601 on the 6th floor - checked in for him by a Thai national.
His aide rented another room on the same floor sharing with another male foreigner, who was arrested along with Hambali and his wife. The identity of this foreigner, believed to be a member of the Jemaah Islamiya (JI) terrorist organisation, remains unknown.
"We wanted to catch Hambali without causing any bloodshed. Some officers suggested that we break in but we didn't know whether he had explosives, grenades or guns in his room, or he would blow himself up and kill our men as well," said the officer.
Finally the officers decided to make a phone call to a top Thai government official, who instructed them to catch Hambali alive.
Shortly before 11.00 p.m. on 11 August 2003, Thai police officers, Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) sharpshooters, and personnel from the Armed Forces Security Centre (AFSC) and the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) were positioned in and around Boonyarak apartment. A telephone operator called Hambali to come downstairs to discuss a matter regarding his phone line.
Hambali was intercepted as he emerged from the elevator. He managed to kick a police officer in the stomach before he was wrestled to the ground by several policemen, who recovered two fully-loaded .380 mm calibre Soviet-made Makarov pistols from his trouser pockets.
Hambali reportedly obtained the guns in Cambodia. He was wearing jeans and T-shirt, a baseball cap, and sunglasses when he was arrested.
Shortly afterwards, the SWAT team armed with HK MP5 machine guns broke into room 601 and arrested Hambali's wife and the foreign JI man. They also stormed the other room but no one was inside. Both rooms were searched and sealed.
DEADLY PLANS UNCOVERED
Police found in Hambali's room a manual on how to assemble a bomb, a large amount of Thai baht, documents, but no explosives or bombs.
From the seized documents, police believe Hambali planned to carry out a series of bomb attacks during the Apec summit, including against the US and British embassies, nightclubs in Phuket and Pattaya, and the check-in counter of El Al Israeli Airlines at Bangkok's Don Muang airport. Hambali also planned to attack an Israeli restaurant in the backpacker's area of Khao San Road in Bangkok.
Hambali was interrogated by Thai police officers shortly after the arrest. "He gave us nothing useful, nothing about his purpose in coming here and what he planned to do," said an officer who took part in the interrogation. "But he was a very clever and convincing talker. After talking to him for several hours, you could be convinced that the cause of Islamic militancy is right."
According to a Thai intelligence officer, Hambali was in Thailand as early as September 2002, before crossing into Cambodia. He first stayed in an apartment near the railway station in Phnom Penh before moving to the lakeside Boeng Kak guesthouse.
"He said he was a businessman by the name of Mizi," the guesthouse owner told Cambodian police. He smoked Marlboro cigarettes and drank Coca Cola. While in his room he listened to BBC radio and read English-language magazines.
Cambodian authorities were poised to arrest Hambali when he suddenly disappeared.
Contrary to what the media reported at the time, the capture of Hambali had nothing to do with the arrest of Malaysian-born Zubair Mohamad, believed to be one of his close associates, in southern Thailand in July 2003. "It (the news leak) was a tactic to cause a rift within the JI movement," said the intelligence officer, who maintained that Zubair did not provide any useful information about Hambali's whereabouts.
So where was Hambali during mid-March and early August 2003?
According to one of the Thai interrogators, Hambali told them that he lived in the Hua Mark area of Bangkok before moving to Ayutthaya. "He said he was very upset with the debauchery of Thai Muslims he met in Hua Mark. He saw young live-in couples who behaved like Westerners, drank alcohol and who always asked him for money. He said he couldn't live there anymore. A friend later advised him to live in Ayutthaya because many good Muslims lived there and he would be safe."
About three weeks before the police swoop, Hambali and his wife moved into Boonyarak apartment. Two motorcycle taxi drivers and a food vendor recognised them when Perspective showed them their photos last week.
"Yes, I remember the couple. They visited the 7-Eleven store from time to time. They were always together, casually dressed like Westerners. They usually left for dinner around 9 p.m. walking across the street to a food market," said one motorcycle taxi driver. "But I did not see them during the daytime."
Another motorcycle taxi driver said he saw Hambali leaving the apartment around 11 p.m. about three to four times. "Each time, he would wait at the street corner - sometimes up to 10-15 minutes - before crossing the street to the petrol station, where a sedan and two modified pick-up trucks had been waiting. The guy you mentioned and the other Arab-looking men wore white hijabs and white skull-caps. The cars sometimes took fuel and the passengers went to the toilet or to buy food. After talking for awhile, Hambali would get inside the car for what appeared to be a long discussion," he recalled.
FLOWN TO GUANTANAMO?
Hambali was flown out of Thailand on a special US jet three days after his arrest. A convoy of cars took him to a remote section of Don Muang airport under tight security at night. All the lights were switched off in that restricted area of the airport, guarded by heavily-armed commandos.
"Hambali was taken into the plane by foreign security agents and that was the last time I saw him," said the senior police officer who took part in the secret operation from the very beginning.
Intelligence sources said Hambali ended his journey at Guantanamo Bay detention centre in Cuba, as did his close aide and other JI man arrested at the apartment, but this could not be confirmed. Hambali's wife was deported to Malaysia where she is now in custody.
"The Americans wanted Hambali badly because of his link with al-Qaeda. It was also a big catch for them as the war on terror at that time - and really to this date - hadn't netted many top terrorist leaders alive," a Western diplomat told Perspective. He said Hambali should be put on trial because he is wanted by Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines for a series of deadly bomb attacks.
"To keep him in Guantanamo, as rumoured, is not the best solution," he said.
Reactions to Hambali's arrest were upbeat from supporters of the war on terror.
A White House spokesman called Hambali's arrest an "important victory in the war on terrorism" and a "significant blow to al-Qaeda." The announcement came aboard Air Force One, as President George W. Bush was flying from Texas to California on August 14, 2003.
In a speech to US Marines in San Diego later in the same day, President Bush said: "Hambali is one of the world's most lethal terrorists who is suspected of planning major terrorist operations He is no longer a problem for those of us who love freedom."
Australian Prime Minister John Howard called Hambali the "ultimate mastermind" of the October 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.
The high-profile statements were not encouraging for Thai officers who felt they didn't get the respect and credit they deserved. This also applies to the reward money paid by the US government.
According to Thai officials, most of the $10 million in reward was distributed to those who had not much to do with the case, while those who worked hard got very little or nothing.
Most of the media reports on the case were incorrect because "firstly, we had to conceal some information to protect our sources and secondly, people from a certain organisation wanted to get all the credit, like they had done everything," said a senior Thai police officer.
"We used all the people we could trust and all the equipment at our disposal. Some agencies paid little attention to our requests, but we were joined later by personnel from the AFSC and the NIA with support from a Western intelligence agency," the officer said.
"But without the tip-off from Cambodia and the hard work done by my people, a series of bomb attacks could have caused large-scale devastation in Thailand," he said.
It was a hot afternoon in mid-March 2003. Inside a Police Special Branch (SB) office in Bangkok, a senior officer was sifting through his "top secret" file when his mobile phone rang. "My friend, we just got information that Hambali and his wife have left for Thailand," said the voice at the other end of the line. The caller was a Cambodian intelligence officer, who had been on the hunt for the alleged terrorist leader for a month.
Earlier in Phnom Penh, Cambodian police had arrested several Islamic teachers and extracted crucial information about Hambali and his Chinese Malaysian wife, Noralwizah Lee Abdullah. Word about the presence of the pair put the SB officer's unit on "red alert".
"My hunch was that Hambali was planning a big operation here," the officer told Perspective. Bangkok was then preparing for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit, which would be attended by 21 world leaders, including US President George W. Bush, in October 2003.
A "war room" was set up, and a nationwide hunt for Hambali - later code-named "Operation Black Magic" - began.
"Everyone was very tense because Hambali was allegedly linked to various bombings that killed some 300 people. He was the most wanted fugitive in the region and was closely linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda movement," said the officer.
"It was confirmed that he organised a meeting for two of 9/11 hijackers when they visited Kuala Lumpur in 2000," he said, adding that Hambali's planned terrorist attacks in Singapore were thwarted in 2001.
Hambali is also believed to have masterminded the Christmas Eve bombings in 2000 in Indonesia (19 dead, 47 wounded), the bombing on September 30, 2000 in metro Manila, the Philippines (22 dead), the Bali attacks on October 12, 2002 (202 dead, more than 330 wounded), and possibly the J.W. Marriot Hotel bombing on August 5, 2003 in Jakarta (12 dead, over 150 wounded).
With the arrest of Hambali in Ayutthaya province on 11 August 2003, the officer believes that a series of major terrorist attacks planned for that year in Bangkok had been averted.
FROM MAE SAI TO AYUTTHAYA
Following the tip-off from Phnom Penh, Thai officers began interrogating several local and foreign Muslims apprehended in and around Bangkok. One of them confirmed that Hambali had entered Thailand from Cambodia.
"The last foreigner we interrogated gave us the name of Hambali's trusted aide. He also told us that Hambali was holding a Spanish passport bought from a pair of Pakistani forgers living in Thailand, who were linked to a Russian-born criminal whom we arrested later," said an officer in charge of the interrogation. "However, none of them knew Hambali's whereabouts, which we learned three days before his arrest."
After locating Hambali's aide, Thai police in early August followed him to the immigration checkpoint in Mae Sai district of the northern province of Chiang Rai. After making a visa extension for Hambali, his aide took a bus back to Bangkok. "We pounced on him at Ekkamai bus station, when he started to run," said the officer.
The police seized from him two passports - one was his own and the other belonged to Hambali, bearing the name of "Daniel Suarez Naviera." This Spanish passport wasn't a fake one as claimed by media reports. It was stolen from its owner, whose photo was replaced with Hambali's.
More importantly, they found on him a room key with the name tag of Boonyarak apartment in Ayutthaya province, 75 kilometres north of Bangkok. The police checked the list of all tenants and found that a man they believed to be Hambali was renting Room 601 on the 6th floor - checked in for him by a Thai national.
His aide rented another room on the same floor sharing with another male foreigner, who was arrested along with Hambali and his wife. The identity of this foreigner, believed to be a member of the Jemaah Islamiya (JI) terrorist organisation, remains unknown.
"We wanted to catch Hambali without causing any bloodshed. Some officers suggested that we break in but we didn't know whether he had explosives, grenades or guns in his room, or he would blow himself up and kill our men as well," said the officer.
Finally the officers decided to make a phone call to a top Thai government official, who instructed them to catch Hambali alive.
Shortly before 11.00 p.m. on 11 August 2003, Thai police officers, Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) sharpshooters, and personnel from the Armed Forces Security Centre (AFSC) and the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) were positioned in and around Boonyarak apartment. A telephone operator called Hambali to come downstairs to discuss a matter regarding his phone line.
Hambali was intercepted as he emerged from the elevator. He managed to kick a police officer in the stomach before he was wrestled to the ground by several policemen, who recovered two fully-loaded .380 mm calibre Soviet-made Makarov pistols from his trouser pockets.
Hambali reportedly obtained the guns in Cambodia. He was wearing jeans and T-shirt, a baseball cap, and sunglasses when he was arrested.
Shortly afterwards, the SWAT team armed with HK MP5 machine guns broke into room 601 and arrested Hambali's wife and the foreign JI man. They also stormed the other room but no one was inside. Both rooms were searched and sealed.
DEADLY PLANS UNCOVERED
Police found in Hambali's room a manual on how to assemble a bomb, a large amount of Thai baht, documents, but no explosives or bombs.
From the seized documents, police believe Hambali planned to carry out a series of bomb attacks during the Apec summit, including against the US and British embassies, nightclubs in Phuket and Pattaya, and the check-in counter of El Al Israeli Airlines at Bangkok's Don Muang airport. Hambali also planned to attack an Israeli restaurant in the backpacker's area of Khao San Road in Bangkok.
Hambali was interrogated by Thai police officers shortly after the arrest. "He gave us nothing useful, nothing about his purpose in coming here and what he planned to do," said an officer who took part in the interrogation. "But he was a very clever and convincing talker. After talking to him for several hours, you could be convinced that the cause of Islamic militancy is right."
According to a Thai intelligence officer, Hambali was in Thailand as early as September 2002, before crossing into Cambodia. He first stayed in an apartment near the railway station in Phnom Penh before moving to the lakeside Boeng Kak guesthouse.
"He said he was a businessman by the name of Mizi," the guesthouse owner told Cambodian police. He smoked Marlboro cigarettes and drank Coca Cola. While in his room he listened to BBC radio and read English-language magazines.
Cambodian authorities were poised to arrest Hambali when he suddenly disappeared.
Contrary to what the media reported at the time, the capture of Hambali had nothing to do with the arrest of Malaysian-born Zubair Mohamad, believed to be one of his close associates, in southern Thailand in July 2003. "It (the news leak) was a tactic to cause a rift within the JI movement," said the intelligence officer, who maintained that Zubair did not provide any useful information about Hambali's whereabouts.
So where was Hambali during mid-March and early August 2003?
According to one of the Thai interrogators, Hambali told them that he lived in the Hua Mark area of Bangkok before moving to Ayutthaya. "He said he was very upset with the debauchery of Thai Muslims he met in Hua Mark. He saw young live-in couples who behaved like Westerners, drank alcohol and who always asked him for money. He said he couldn't live there anymore. A friend later advised him to live in Ayutthaya because many good Muslims lived there and he would be safe."
About three weeks before the police swoop, Hambali and his wife moved into Boonyarak apartment. Two motorcycle taxi drivers and a food vendor recognised them when Perspective showed them their photos last week.
"Yes, I remember the couple. They visited the 7-Eleven store from time to time. They were always together, casually dressed like Westerners. They usually left for dinner around 9 p.m. walking across the street to a food market," said one motorcycle taxi driver. "But I did not see them during the daytime."
Another motorcycle taxi driver said he saw Hambali leaving the apartment around 11 p.m. about three to four times. "Each time, he would wait at the street corner - sometimes up to 10-15 minutes - before crossing the street to the petrol station, where a sedan and two modified pick-up trucks had been waiting. The guy you mentioned and the other Arab-looking men wore white hijabs and white skull-caps. The cars sometimes took fuel and the passengers went to the toilet or to buy food. After talking for awhile, Hambali would get inside the car for what appeared to be a long discussion," he recalled.
FLOWN TO GUANTANAMO?
Hambali was flown out of Thailand on a special US jet three days after his arrest. A convoy of cars took him to a remote section of Don Muang airport under tight security at night. All the lights were switched off in that restricted area of the airport, guarded by heavily-armed commandos.
"Hambali was taken into the plane by foreign security agents and that was the last time I saw him," said the senior police officer who took part in the secret operation from the very beginning.
Intelligence sources said Hambali ended his journey at Guantanamo Bay detention centre in Cuba, as did his close aide and other JI man arrested at the apartment, but this could not be confirmed. Hambali's wife was deported to Malaysia where she is now in custody.
"The Americans wanted Hambali badly because of his link with al-Qaeda. It was also a big catch for them as the war on terror at that time - and really to this date - hadn't netted many top terrorist leaders alive," a Western diplomat told Perspective. He said Hambali should be put on trial because he is wanted by Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines for a series of deadly bomb attacks.
"To keep him in Guantanamo, as rumoured, is not the best solution," he said.
Reactions to Hambali's arrest were upbeat from supporters of the war on terror.
A White House spokesman called Hambali's arrest an "important victory in the war on terrorism" and a "significant blow to al-Qaeda." The announcement came aboard Air Force One, as President George W. Bush was flying from Texas to California on August 14, 2003.
In a speech to US Marines in San Diego later in the same day, President Bush said: "Hambali is one of the world's most lethal terrorists who is suspected of planning major terrorist operations He is no longer a problem for those of us who love freedom."
Australian Prime Minister John Howard called Hambali the "ultimate mastermind" of the October 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.
The high-profile statements were not encouraging for Thai officers who felt they didn't get the respect and credit they deserved. This also applies to the reward money paid by the US government.
According to Thai officials, most of the $10 million in reward was distributed to those who had not much to do with the case, while those who worked hard got very little or nothing.
Most of the media reports on the case were incorrect because "firstly, we had to conceal some information to protect our sources and secondly, people from a certain organisation wanted to get all the credit, like they had done everything," said a senior Thai police officer.
"We used all the people we could trust and all the equipment at our disposal. Some agencies paid little attention to our requests, but we were joined later by personnel from the AFSC and the NIA with support from a Western intelligence agency," the officer said.
"But without the tip-off from Cambodia and the hard work done by my people, a series of bomb attacks could have caused large-scale devastation in Thailand," he said.
1 comment:
We heard it from the Thai officer. $10 millions bucks went to corrupt people while little or nothing went to hard working men amd women.
Thanks for mentioning our Cambodian officers who gave you tip for the arrest. I hope that your government, Thai people and President Bush heard about this as well.
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