Al-Qaida European recruiter 'in Indonesia'

An al-Qaida operative who allegedly brought hundreds of European Islamic militants to Indonesia for military training is in the country, an intelligence official said today, refusing to say if he was under arrest.

Parlindungan Siregar, who has been on the run for more than four years, allegedly brought members of a Spanish al-Qaida cell to the Indonesian island of Sulawesi in 2001 for secret training, terrorism experts said.

“I have been told that Parlindungan Siregar is in Indonesia,” Maj. Gen. Police Ansyaad Mbai said, quoting officials at the State Intelligence Agency. “I don’t know, however, if they’ve interrogated or captured him.”

His comments followed a report in The Asian Wall Street Journal that the terror suspect was apprehended two weeks ago.

Spanish authorities have in the past claimed that Siregar – a suspected member of Southeast Asia's Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist network – arranged for several hundred al-Qaida operatives to travel to Indonesia.

Siregar’s arrest, if confirmed, could shed light on ties between the two groups.

Brig. Gen. Soenarko Danu Darwanto, a spokesman for Indonesia’s national police, said he had no information on Siregar but was investigating.