Pakistan's Foreign Ministry confirms arrest of Bali bomb suspect

Pakistan's Foreign Ministry confirms arrest of Bali bomb suspect

2011-04-01 21:42:10 GMT+7 (ICT)

JAKARTA, INDONESIA (BNO NEWS) -- Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman on Friday appeared on national television and confirmed that the country's security forces had captured a man wanted in connection with the 2002 Bali bombing.

Pakistan's Foreign Minister spokesman Tehmina Janjua stated that the arrested individual could be the Bali bombing suspect, and authorities would give consular access to an Indonesian team that traveled to the country to verify the arrest, Indonesia's Antara news agency reported.

Meanwhile, Indonesia's Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa spoke at the presidential palace in Jakarta, Indonesia, saying that authorities were still conducting the process to confirm the individual's identity.

Indonesian National police chief General Timur Pradopo said the teams sent by the national police and the State Intelligence Agency carried data of Umar Patek's finger prints and DNA to be matched with those of the person reported to be Patek.

On Wednesday, the government of Indonesia announced that a police team had been deployed to Pakistan to review the arrest of Indonesian national Patek, who is also the most wanted terrorist in the Southeast Asian country for the first Bali bombing in 2002 that killed 202 people, including 88 Australian nationals and other foreign citizens.

Patek, who is also known as Abdul Goni and Abu Syiekh, is believed to be a member of a group, which carried out military and fighting exercises in Afghanistan and Pakistan in the 1980's and 1990s.

The wanted fugitive later formed Jemaah Islamiyah, and then organized a series of suicide bombings targeting nightclubs, restaurants, hotels, offices and embassies of Western countries in Indonesia.

After the Bali bombing, Patek was believed to have fled to the Philippines, and in March 2010, the Jamestown Foundation, a national security policy reviewer institution in Washington, believed he was in Sulu province, southern Philippines.

The reported arrest in Pakistan is raising questions on how the top terrorist fugitive could have fled the country.

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