Terrorism cannot be handled alone, so Indonesia needs to work along with neighboring countries in the context of handling this issue, although the main information remains in Indonesia.
So far, information sharing among ASEAN countries to counter radicalism has not been considered effective. Moreover, information-sharing policies are not applied due to sectoral ego and inter-agency competition.
Hence, National Police Chief General Tito Karnavian has reiterated the importance of cooperation between countries in handling and overcoming crimes of terrorist groups.
While speaking on the practice of eradicating sources of terrorism funds at the 4th Annual Counter-Terrorism Financing (CTF) Summit 2018 in Bangkok, Thailand, recently, Karnavian spoke at length on the latest developments in terrorism crimes that occurred in Indonesia, the trend of terrorism funding, changes in the modus operandi, and several cases of handling the flow of terrorist funds by the National Police.
On the occasion, the National Police chief pointed to the case of the Bali Bombing I, the terror attack at Thamrin Jakarta, and the latest terrorist attack in Surabaya, East Java.
In addition, Karnavian offered his views on the significant role of the Financial Intelligence Unit in various countries to break the flow of funds and logistics for terrorist groups.
"It is necessary to share information and develop capacity among the law enforcement bodies, including Financial Intelligence Units, especially in Asia and Australia," he stated.
This year`s CTF Summit was held based on the success of earlier meetings in Sydney, Australia; Bali, Indonesia; and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. This year, Thailand`s Anti Money Laundering Office hosted a collaboration with the Financial Transaction Reporting and Analysis Center and AUSTRAC.
Held on November 6-8, 2018, the 4th Annual CTF Summit 2018 was attended by the heads of Financial Intelligence Units, senior representatives of policy makers, law enforcement, policy institutions, and national security.
Participants from various industries and academics from several countries gave greater attention to the prevention of funding of terrorism and high-risk financial crimes.
The opening ceremony began with a speech by Australian Minister of Home Affairs Petter Dutton, Indonesian Coordinating Minister of Law and Human Rights Wiranto, and keynote speaker Deputy Prime Minister of Thailand Wissanu Krea-Ngarm.
The three officials agreed on the importance of tackling terrorist funding to minimize terrorism crimes that occur and involve several countries in the world.
The idea of the National Police Chief delivered at the 4th Annual High-Level CTF Meeting in Bangkok demonstrated his ability to deal with acts of terrorism.
Accordingly, Indonesian Police Strategic Study Institute (Lemkapi) lauded the idea of National Police Chief General Karnavian to break the funding of global terrorism.
Lemkapi Executive Director Dr Edi Hasibuan remarked in Jakarta that Karnavian has rolled out the need for cooperation between countries to break the flow of international terrorist network funds to make the world safe.
He believes that Indonesia should be proud of having the National Police chief, who has the expertise to handle terrorism, including initiating cooperation to cut funding.
Hasibuan said the National Police chief argued that the financial intelligence units of countries should also cooperate to break the flow of funds and logistics of terrorist groups.
"The idea of cooperation between financial intelligence units was considered reasonable and immediately received the support of all countries at the international forum," Hasibuan stated.
He believes that currently, the threat of terrorism can occur anywhere, so it requires strong cooperation between law enforcers, including the financial intelligence units of all countries.
Indonesian police is said to be one of the most successful in dealing with terrorism, so it is not surprising if several police from various countries in the world take a cue from their Indonesian counterpart to deal with terrorism.
In addition to the National Police chief, Defense Minister Ryamizard Ryacudu has called on all countries in Asia and Europe to include intelligence cooperation as a form of future strategy in the efforts to counter terrorism.
Ryacudu made the call at the Third Asia-Europe Counter-Terrorism Dialogue at the European External Action Service building in Brussels, Belgium, on October 15, 2018.
On the occasion, Ryacudu emphasized the danger of terrorism as a real threat to state security. During a meeting with the North Atlantic Treaty Association delegation, he highlighted the importance of extra regional cooperation involving countries outside the ASEAN region and Asian continent.
In his speech, bearing the theme "Future of Counter-Terrorism: A Shift from Cooperation to Collaboration," Ryacudu urged every country to participate in building an extra regional security cooperation architecture.
He explained that extra regional security cooperation architecture is vital and necessary to strengthen the coordination mechanism and collaboration in facing a common threat of terrorism through stronger intelligence cooperation.
He remarked that the threat of terrorism has major impacts on several aspects of the lives of people, and terrorism can affect any country in the world.
"The threat of terrorism does not recognize national borders, does not know religion, does not know time, and does not choose victims," he pointed out.
The defense minister also highlighted the need to build an architecture for international and inter-regional security cooperation in an effort to combat terrorism.
Editing by Fardah Assedaf
Reporter: Otniel Tamindael
Editor: Heru Purwanto
Copyright © ANTARA 2018
