JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) – The death of Indonesia’s most-wanted terror leader in a raid this week closes one of the country’s biggest manhunts – a seven-year chase for a charismatic militant who taught followers to build bombs and wore veils to elude capture.
Authorities who had scoured much of Southeast Asia for Noordin Top finally ended their search Thursday in a police shootout at a safe house in central Java. Police, who identified Noordin’s body by his fingerprints, plan to announce the results of a DNA test today.
Despite a reward of $100,000 and numerous premature reports that the Malaysian national had been killed, police say Noordin was able to evade authorities and at the same time have a hand in every major recent terror attack in Indonesia.
According to one former associate, Noordin was extremely cautious during his time on the run, never using a mobile phone and always having at least two guards with him whenever he went outside.
Sometimes he would even don a veil and disguise himself as a woman, said Nasir Abas, who helped train Noordin as a former commander for regional terror network Jemaah Islamiyah but who now works with the government to help rehabilitate arrested terrorists.
But it was his charisma and his drive to convert new followers, much like that of his idol Osama bin Laden, that allowed his militant network to function even under such scrutiny, Abas said.
“He was always full of creative ideas and was ambitious to be a leader,” Abas said in an interview. “He was a good speaker and had the ability to convince people to support his ideas and recruit suicide bombers.”
Noordin claimed to have taught 1,000 followers how to make bombs and carry out suicide attacks, said Al Chaidar, a terrorism expert and lecturer at Malikussaleh University in Aceh province who met Noordin in 2005 while researching a book.
“His voice, his intonation was very special, and that impressed many people,” Chaidar said.
Noordin’s extremist ideology alienated most Indonesians, who usually follow a moderate version of Islam, but appealed to a core of hardened followers.
“He was the only major extremist leader in Indonesia, probably in Malaysia and Singapore too, who remained committed to the al-Qaeda version of history, which says that the United States is the major enemy of Islam and therefore a war has to be waged on America and its allies,” said Sidney Jones, a terrorism analyst at the International Crisis Group think tank.