Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Peace in Our Time...

The Indonesians have decided to crack down on Jemaah Islamiyah, the terrorist group behind the Bali bombings, but this article in the Age (Australian) seems to feel that it would have been better to just ignore JI.

"This is a dangerous development," terrorism expert Sidney Jones told The Age yesterday.

"The ramifications could well be an energising of the jihadist movement, which in my opinion had been steadily weakening," said Ms Jones, the Jakarta-based director of the International Crisis Group.

Because, if you ignore them, they'll just go away. Or at least be merely "sporadic."

Rassyah was trained in terrorism in the same class in Afghanistan as Ali Ghufron, alias Mukhlas, one of three bombers on death row who carried out the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, including 82 holidaying Australians. He apparently turned up in Poso in 2004.

Since then, Islamic extremists in the town have been blamed for sporadic bombings, beheadings, shootings and other attacks, which prompted the Government in Jakarta to authorise the US and Australian-trained Detachment 88 anti-terror squad to go to Poso to crack down on them. The policeman killed on Monday was from the squad.

What's a few beheaded school girls between friends?

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