Medan, Indonesia – Nasir Abbas, a former member of the Indonesian hardline group Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) describes fellow recruit Encep Nurjaman as “sometimes Javanese”.
Nurjaman, who is healthier recognized by his nom de guerre Hambali in addition to by the alias Riduan Isamuddin, was “well mannered”, “tender” and “correct”, Abbas instructed Al Jazeera, remembering the time the 2 males have been a part of one of the vital fearsome teams in Southeast Asia.
Hambali and Abbas each educated in navy fight collectively in Afghanistan within the Nineteen Nineties, earlier than becoming a member of JI which was labelled a terrorist organisation by america authorities after the group claimed a string of assaults throughout Indonesia within the early 2000s, together with the Bali Bombing in 2002, which left greater than 200 folks lifeless.
“He was so eloquent and so intelligent. You couldn’t assist however be left with a superb impression of him,” mentioned Abbas, who co-operated with the authorities following his arrest and now works on deradicalisation programmes for the Indonesian authorities.
The US didn’t really feel that means.
Hambali, who’s now 57, has spent the final 16 years at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, and was described by former US President George W Bush as “one of many world’s most deadly terrorists”.
Twenty years for the reason that first detainees have been despatched to Guantanamo, Hambali stays one in every of 39 males nonetheless held there.
Of 800 incarcerated within the facility because it was opened, solely 12 have been charged with battle crimes and have stood, or will stand, trial on the facility’s Camp Justice in entrance of a navy fee. Hambali, who’s charged with homicide, terrorism and conspiracy, is one in every of them.
“The place of america Authorities is that the people who’re in Guantanamo typically, but in addition when charged within the navy commissions, are a class of what are known as illegal combatants,” mentioned Michel Paradis, a human rights lawyer, nationwide safety legislation scholar and lecturer at Columbia Legislation Faculty in New York.
“Hambali is a combatant within the battle on terrorism within the authorities’s view and, as such, will be prosecuted for battle crimes.”
In courtroom paperwork seen by Al Jazeera, these battle crimes relate to the 2002 Bali bombings, which focused folks having fun with an evening out within the buzzing Kuta district of the island, and a 2003 assault on the JW Marriott Lodge in Indonesia’s capital, Jakarta, during which 12 folks have been killed. Tons of have been injured in each Jakarta and Bali.
Hambali will stand trial with two Malaysians and alleged “accomplices” – Mohammed Nazir bin Lep and Mohammed Farik bin Amin – however some query whether or not they are going to be capable of get a good listening to.
“A recurring function of the Battle on Terror has been the invocation of terrorism as an unprecedented and distinctive act. That is regardless of it being a recurring technique utilized by quite a lot of teams, actions and governments all through historical past,” Ian Wilson, a senior lecturer in politics and safety research at Australia’s Murdoch College, instructed Al Jazeera.
“This ‘distinctive’ nature has been used to rationalise measures that circumvent or negate current authorized and rights frameworks, together with these inscribed in constitutions comparable to rights to due course of and presumption of innocence. This ‘state of exception’ in response to the perceived danger and risk of terrorism has resulted in important deterioration within the rule of legislation, and main swings in the direction of illiberalism in democratic states.”
Wilson says Guantanamo Bay is an instance of this strategy – a spot thought of of “distinctive sovereignty” by Washington, but in addition someplace portrayed as exterior the formal authorized jurisdiction of america.
Torture
Detainees comparable to Hambali, haven’t solely been denied the authorized rights and due course of that will have been afforded them by the structure in a trial on US soil, but in addition the rights within the Geneva Conventions given to these being tried for battle crimes.
Hambali, by his attorneys, has alleged that he was brutally tortured following his arrest in Thailand in 2003, after which he says he was transferred to a secret detention camp run by the Central Intelligence Company (CIA) and tortured as a part of the company’s Rendition, Detention and Interrogation Program (RDI) which is usually known as the “torture programme”.
The coverage was adopted within the aftermath of the September 11 assaults on america with then-President Bush agreeing that sure torture methods could possibly be justified in the event that they have been in a position to extract intelligence that will forestall different assaults in opposition to the nation from occurring. Beneath worldwide legislation, torture isn’t justified.
In accordance with Hambali’s lawyer, the Indonesian was stripped bare, disadvantaged of meals and sleep and made to face in stress positions – comparable to kneeling on the ground along with his fingers above his head – for hours as a part of the programme.
He was additionally allegedly subjected to “walling” – a torture method the place interrogators place a collar round a detainee’s neck and slam their head in opposition to a wall.
Different Guantanamo detainees have described being sexually assaulted and waterboarded whereas in detention.
The Senate Intelligence Committee investigated the CIA’s rendition programme amid persistent allegations of torture at Guantanamo and different so-called CIA black websites around the globe.
Launched in 2014, the report discovered that the torture methods used – referred to euphemistically as “enhanced interrogation methods” – weren’t solely inhumane, but in addition ineffective in acquiring intelligence.
Nearly all of detainees, together with Hambali, gave incorrect info to the authorities merely to make the torture cease, the report mentioned.
“He had offered the false info in an try to scale back the strain on himself…and to present an account that was in step with what [Hambali] assessed the questioners wished to listen to,” the report mentioned, citing a CIA cable.
‘Worst of each worlds’
Throughout his time with Jemaah Islamiyah, which was affiliated with al-Qaeda, Hambali was most frequently described as a “cash man”, in response to Abbas.
His primary position was gathering and distributing funds from the organisation’s many donors, amongst them al-Qaeda’s former chief, Osama Bin Laden, who is assumed to have despatched cash for the Bali Bombing on to Hambali.
Nonetheless, in Abbas’ telling, Hambali agreed with Bin Laden that civilians could possibly be focused in terrorist assaults, one thing that was extraordinarily controversial amongst different JI operatives, a lot of whom solely thought of navy targets as truthful sport.
“We have been educated in a navy setting in Afghanistan with navy data and I used to be not snug with attacking civilian targets,” mentioned Abbas.
“I wouldn’t enable it. Nobody concerned within the Bali Bombing was courageous sufficient to ask me for something. They knew I might by no means conform to the killing of civilians. Those that did agree have been misguided and I instructed them that.”
Three of the primary perpetrators of the Bali Bombing have been sentenced to dying in Indonesia and executed, whereas a fourth perpetrator, Ali Imron, was given a life sentence after he apologised and expressed regret.
Imron has at all times maintained that Hambali had no prior data of the assault.
Twenty years for the reason that bombings – the worst assault in Southeast Asia – Abbas says he feels that his former comrade needs to be returned to Indonesia to face trial.
It’s a view shared by Indonesian human rights lawyer Ranto Sibarani who says the Indonesian authorities ought to have tried to barter his repatriation.
“Irrespective of how severe the accusations or costs in opposition to Hambali, he’s nonetheless an Indonesian citizen who deserves safety in response to the legislation,” Sibarani instructed Al Jazeera in August.
“That’s an enormous query that’s going to loom over the trial,” mentioned Paradis. “Does america even have the authority to prosecute him? Terrorism just isn’t a battle crime.”
In 2009, the US departments of justice and defence described the navy commissions as “truthful, efficient, and lawful”.
“Army commissions have been utilized by america to strive those that have violated the legislation of battle for greater than two centuries,” it mentioned in a press assertion.
No date has been set for Hambali’s trial, however many are pessimistic about how the authorized course of will play out as soon as the fee lastly will get below means.
“The navy trials are fatally flawed and the authorized course of has been completely compromised by the CIA torture programme,” Quinton Temby, an assistant professor in public coverage at Monash College, Indonesia, instructed Al Jazeera.
“It’s the worst of each worlds: the detainees gained’t obtain a good trial and the households of victims gained’t see the perpetrators held to account in open courtroom.”