Heru Andriyanto – Radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir lambasted the United States and its allies for their relentless attempts to convict him of terrorism when he appeared in the South Jakarta District Court on Thursday.
Reading his preliminary defense statement, Bashir told the court that the US and its allies were behind his three trials in the course of eight years.
"When I returned from a journey to Malaysia, the Pharaoh America accused me of being an Al Qaeda leader that should be eliminated from Indonesia," Bashir said as he read from the 90-page statement.
"The US envoy said at UIN [State Islamic University]: 'We will make efforts so as to prevent Abu Bakar from managing his organization," the defendant said without citing names.
He claimed the US government approached then President Megawati Sukarnoputri with a request to imprison him in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp for the rest of his life.
"But Allah helped my by giving Megawati the courage to firmly reject the request," he said.
The second attempt by the US was to implicate him in the 2002 Bali bombings by pressuring police to manipulate the dossiers of the three bombers to make it look as though he had ordered the attacks.
"The three mujahedeen, including the late Mukhlas, the late Amrozi, and the late Imam Samudera – with God's will they died as martyrs – were forced to sign dossiers stating that I had ordered the bombings. They did so after being unable to withstand heinous torture by the police," Bashir said.
"The goal of the move was to kill me with capital punishment, whereas I knew nothing about the attacks except from TV."
Bashir said he was acquitted of the Bali bombing charge because the three militants who were eventually executed by the firing squad rejected the content of the dossiers during the court hearing.
He was convicted of immigration offenses for leaving Indonesia for Malaysia illegally. "I went to Malaysia because [then president] Suharto wanted to arrest me, as I challenged the single state philosophy of Pancasila," he said.
The second charge relating to the 2003 terrorist attack on the JW Marriott Hotel in Jakarta was also fabricated, he said. When the attack was carried out, "I was still on trial and kept in detention. Besides, I have no idea what the name Marriott refers to," he claimed.
He criticized the police's counter-terror unit Densus 88 as being a tool of the United States, Australia and their allies to combat mujahedeen in Indonesia.
"Densus 88 has the bomb disposal unit and is dominated by Christian officers led by Gories Mere. It's establishment and operations were funded by America and Australia. Basically, Densus 88 is the tool of America and Australia whose goals are to eliminate the warriors who fight for Islamic Shariah," he said.
The term 'terrorist' had been spread by the Zionists, America, Australia, and followed by Densus 88, the cleric said.
"The fight against terrorism was actually a fight against mujahedeen," the cleric said. "Mujahedeen are attributed to terrorists so that Muslims lose their courage to wage jihad," he said.
Regarding the paramilitary training in Aceh, for which Bashir is accused of leading and raising funds, the defendant said the camp was set up "to follow orders from Allah that Muslims perform 'I'dad', or getting prepared with arms, to cause fear among the enemies of Islam so that they did not disturb Muslims," he said.