It was announced that the much wanted man - Hambali, the No 2 man in the Jemaah Islamiyah organisation - was captured in Thailand by the C.I.A and a Foreign Government, and currently held in an overseas location.
This report from the Associated Press differ from the reports on the CNN and Straits Times websites, with both reporting that FBI and Thai authorities had arrested Hambali.
It will not be surprising if the unreported Foreign Government may turn out to be Singapore, and that Hambali is now being interrogated at the HQ of Singapore I.S.D.
With Singapore's close ties to Thailand - politically, militarily and security - and Singapore's regional superiority in SigInt, it is quite possible that this hunt for J.I. No 2 had Singapore's involvement.
High al-Qaida leader seized By JOHN J. LUMPKIN and SLOBODAN LEKIC
Associated Press WASHINGTON -- He reportedly set up a meeting between al-Qaida and two of the Sept. 11 hijackers. Intelligence reports say he planned a second wave of attacks foiled at the last minute. The White House says he tried to recruit new pilots to carry out additional Sept. 11-like suicide missions in the United States. The Bali bombings that killed 202 people purportedly were carried out under his watch.
He is Riduan Isamuddin, a 39-year-old Indonesian cleric better known as Hambali -- once one of the world's most-wanted terrorists. He created the Southeast Asian terror group Jemaah Islamiyah in al-Qaida's image, recruited eager young Muslims and sent them to al-Qaida training camps in Afghanistan.
On Thursday, the United States announced he was captured at last.
Hambali, whose whereabouts had been unknown since he disappeared after Sept. 11, 2001, seems to be linked to nearly every major al-Qaida and Jemaah Islamiyah plot since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon -- and several before that.
Hambali was detained this week during a joint operation run by the CIA and a foreign government in Southeast Asia.
American officials declined to identify that government, although foreign newspapers reported Hambali was taken in Thailand.
He has been taken to an undisclosed location overseas for interrogation by American officials.An al-Qaida detainee first told of Hambali's assignment to find more suicide hijackers not long after the attacks of Sept. 11, a senior Bush administration official said. Other sources confirmed his efforts. Hambali also received money earlier this year from an al-Qaida operative in Pakistan, the official said.
'No longer a problem'
A U.S. counterterrorism official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said it is unclear how successful his recruiting drive was, but that he will be interrogated on the matter.
President Bush described Hambali as a notorious figure and a killer.
"He is no longer a problem to those of us who love freedom," Bush said during a speech Thursday to troops at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Calif. "And neither are nearly two-thirds of known senior al-Qaida leaders, operational managers and key facilitators who have been captured or have been killed."
Hambali is suspected of ties to several recent attacks, including the Aug. 5 bombing of the J.W. Marriott Hotel in Jakarta, Indonesia, that killed 12 people and injured 150.
He is suspected of playing an organizing role in the Oct. 12, 2002, bombing of a nightclub in Bali that killed about 200 people, many of them Australians.
Jemaah Islamiyah also is believed to be behind a foiled plot to bomb Western targets in Singapore in late 2001, and a series of church bombings in Indonesia and the Philippines in December 2000. Authorities also say Hambali is connected to the Sept. 11 plot, although whether he played a direct role is unclear.
In January 2000, Hambali had one of his deputies host meetings between two eventual Sept. 11 hijackers, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, and a high-ranking al-Qaida figure who organized the bombing of the USS Cole, at his apartment in Malaysia in January 2000.
He was one of two key leaders the CIA had identified as leaders of Jemaah Islamiyah. The other, the Indonesian cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, founded the group in 1989 and served as its spiritual leader, U.S. officials said. Bashir lived openly and was detained in October 2002. He denies any links to Jemaah Islamiyah.
Outside of Indonesia, the group operates in Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, Myanmar and Thailand.
Group will persist
Vince Cannistraro, a former CIA counterterrorism chief, cautioned that the capture of the group's leaders does not render it ineffective.
"Hambali is the key guy, but it's not going to stop [Jemaah Islamiyah] from carrying out more attacks," he said.
Bush said Hambali was close to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks. Counterterrorism officials said Hambali is the highest-ranking operative from al-Qaida captured since Mohammed was taken in Pakistan on March 1.
Hambali's capture comes after an increase in violence connected to Islamic militants across Asia.
-- Associated Press writer Curt Anderson contributed to this article
http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/0803/15captured.html