With the aim to arming and training extremists and supporting their families, about $500,000 in Australian cash was sent to Indonesia, a terror financing investigation has recently uncovered.
The cash was raised and transferred by an Australian man identified only by the letter L. this was revealed after a joint investigation between Australia and Indonesia.
Some of the donors from whom money was collected might not have even been aware that the money was to be used to fund terrorism, said investigaors.
Agus Santoso, the deputy chairman of Indonesia's financial tracking watchdog, the Financial Transactions and Analysis Centre (PPATK) confirmed the details of the information.
"The one in Australia is a local Australian, not an Indonesian who is living in Australia and sending money to Indonesia," he said.
"The money was used for: one, to recruit people; secondly to fund training; thirdly to buy weapons, and the fourth is to give livelihood for the terrorists' family because the money goes to support the families of the terrorists who died," Santoso added.
While it is believed that at least 200 Indonesians have gone to Syria to fight for the Islamic State militant group, intelligence reports said that at least 60 of them have been killed.
Some of the Australians who donated may not have realized that their cash was going to fund extremism, PPATK chairman Muhammad Yusuf said.
"It could be when it happened, from the perspective of the donor; it was meant for charity not for terrorism," he said.
A group of alleged terrorists were arrested in Indonesia last week and the country’s authorities said that it was possible that the Australian cash may have been used to support local terror networks.
There have been intelligence reports that terrorist groups were planning to strike attacks against the nation's minority Shiite community, Christians and possibly even westerners. Part of this plot was revealed after the arrest of 11 people in the country across Java.
They were arrested by special forces from Indonesia's anti-terror body Densus 88.
The Indonesian networks became apparent after the sleuths in the country got information from from Australia's counter-terrorism financing watchdog AusTrac which was critical In making the arrests, Santoso said.
"We really appreciate the cooperation with AusTrac and the AFP. It revealed the terrorism network between Australia and Indonesia, the network has been revealed, and we have handed over the case to Densus 88 to follow up," he said.
Indonesia is still on a state of heightened terror alert, with particularly tight security for the nation's New Year celebrations.
(Source:www.abc.net.au)
