REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, MALANG -- Personnel of East Java's anti-terror police squad Densus-88 arrested two suspected followers of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) here on Wednesday.
The two suspects were AHM (45), a resident of Ade Irma Suryani, and HA (51), a resident of Jalan Soputan of Malang district, East Java.
Head of the Public Relations Division of the National Police Headquarters, Brigadier General Anton Charliyan, said that the arrests in Malang were made after investigators linked them with the five terrorist suspects arrested on Sunday.
"Further investigations were conducted in East Java after the earlier arrests were made," he affirmed.
On Sunday, the anti-terror police squad had raided the house of M. Amin Mude (AM), who was suspected to have given Indonesians leaving to join the ISIS abroad financial backing.
"Today, we searched the house of suspect AM for allegedly having funded and facilitated people willing to go to Syria (to join the ISIS terrorist group)," Head of Densus-88, Senior Commissioner Faisal Tayib, had noted in Jakarta on Sunday.
Tayib added that officers of Densus-88 arrested AM in the wee hours of Sunday. He said that the police had nabbed AM last December for facilitating the accommodation of 16 Indonesian citizens from Makassar, South Sulawesi, who were to leave for Syria.
"But his arrest now is related to his alleged terrorism-related crime," he pointed out.
Moreover, Deputy Chairman of Commission I, which oversees foreign affairs, of the House of Representatives Tubagus Hasanudin stated on Wednesday that at least 514 Indonesians had joined the ISIS.
"Based on information I have, some 514 Indonesian have joined ISIS, and four of them have been killed in combat," Hasanuddin said.
However, the commission I deputy chief could not give details about the places where the 514 Indonesians hailed from. "What is certain is that they are all Indonesians," he remarked.