Left Flank

RP-US military and law enforcement cooperation has netted a body with a sadistic past. The corpse of Dulmatin, an Indonesian member of Jemaah Islamiyah(JI), was recovered from Tawi-Tawi, and another JI operative, Mohamad Baehaqi, is in custody.

US Federal Bureau of Investigation and Filipino crime laboratory experts have arrived in this southern city to conduct the tests that officials say will take about a week.

Tissue from the exhumed body will be compared with samples that were taken from Dulmatin's children in the southern Philippines last year.

The US government has offered a 10 million-dollar bounty for Dulmatin, a senior figure in the Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) movement, who is believed to have been hiding out in the south for most of the past five years.

He was earlier reported to have been wounded in a clash with government troops in the region on January 31.

The recovered body bore gunshot wounds in the head, chest and right foot, consistent with earlier accounts of Dulmatin's injuries in the gunfight, Dolorfino said. This bolstered their belief that the body was that of the Indonesian.

Dolorfino said that if that is confirmed, then "this is a big blow to them (JI) as he is the most wanted personality in the Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah" in the Philippines.

The suspect had helped plan and carry out the 2002 bombings in Bali that left 202 people -- many of them Australian tourists -- dead.

According to durianburgdavao's Balanza, Dulmatin had several acolytes, including Mohammed Baehaqi, who were also arrested.

Muhammad Baehaqi alias Latip, Salam and Tato, was collared during a raid by military in a house in Piso, Banaybanay in possession of a .22 Winchester rifle, a shotgun and blasting caps, detonating cords and other bomb-making materials and equipment.

Arrested with Baehaqi were Idamat Generoso and his son Ustadz Mujar, who is a member of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) that the military said is linked to the Jemaah Islamiyah. Baehagi was nabbed in the house of the Idamat Generoso, an employee of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.

Baehaqi is said to have undergone explosives training under Jemaah Islamiyah bomb experts Dulmatin and Omar Patek, and suspected as the leader of a terrorist team that recently bombed General Santos City, and Makilala and Kidapawan City in North Cotabato.

There is also this Jamestown Foundation piece about the importance of breaking up Dulmatin's group.