From Reuters, with thanks to Jefffrey Imm.
KUALA LUMPUR – Malaysia declared victory on Tuesday in its internal campaign against Southeast Asia’s most feared Islamic militant group, but said there was room for improved U.S. cooperation in the global war on terror.
“We have dismantled the JI basic structure,” Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak told Reuters, referring to Jemaah Islamiah, a group blamed for a series of attacks in neighbouring Indonesia, including the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people.
“But we cannot be too complacent,” he added.
“There could be certain cells (that re-establish themselves) later on if we don’t monitor the situation carefully.”
Malaysia is viewed as having effectively used skills it acquired in ending a bitter communist insurgency in the 1960s against Islamic militancy, but some of its most wanted militants fled to Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation.
Malaysians Azahari Husin, a bomb-making expert, and Noordin M. Top, another JI member, are thought by Indonesian police to be planning another attack there. Police suspect Azahari made the bombs used in Bali and in the suicide bombing of a Jakarta hotel.
“We would like them arrested as soon as possible,” Najib said in an interview in his parliamentary office.
“When we started to pursue them, or when they realised they were being pursued, they ran away to Indonesia. We have given the Indonesians as much information as we know about them but the actual interdiction of these people must be done by Indonesia.”
Australia and the United States recently issued warnings to their citizens in Indonesia, saying intelligence suggested that terrorists were in the advanced stages of planning attacks…