Linking Bin Laden to Bali

DANIEL BROOKS/CORBIS SYGMA The nightclub bombings in Bali left 193 dead

Indonesian officials have been reluctant to make a direct link between the bombings last October in Bali and al-Qaeda, the terrorist network headed by Osama bin Laden. Many of those arrested were members of Jemaah Islamiah (J.I.), an Islamic militant group with adherents throughout Southeast Asia. But as recently as Jan. 8, Indonesia's top police official said, "We haven't come to any conclusion yet whether there is a link between Jemaah Islamiah and al-Qaeda."

Some of those accused of the bombings, however, paint a very different picture. The 27-page confession to local police by Ali Gufron, better known by his J.I. code name Mukhlas, refers to the time he met bin Laden in Afghanistan during a three-year stay there.

In the confession, a copy of which TIME has seen, Mukhlas says he believes the $25,000 that he and other plotters were given for the Bali operation by Riduan Isamuddin, J.I.'s operations chief also known as Hambali, may have originally come from bin Laden. Bali investigators are also looking into the possibility that a hardened al-Qaeda operative named Syafullah—a Yemeni who entered Indonesia on a fake U.S. visa—may have been in charge of mixing the chemicals used in the bombs. Mukhlas says that he, Hambali (who is still on the lam) and other J.I. leaders maintained close ties with al-Qaeda from the late 1980s on, and the official police summary of Mukhlas' interrogation states baldly, "Jemaah Islamiah's jihad operations were funded by al-Qaeda."

Why the reluctance by Indonesian officials to acknowledge a link? Because the Bali bombings remain controversial. J.I.'s suspected spiritual leader, the influential cleric Abubakar Ba'asyir, has been detained since October. But speculation in Jakarta continues that he is being protected by hard-line Islamic sympathizers at the top levels of President Megawati Sukarnoputri's government. General I Made Mangku Pastika, the officer in charge of the Bali investigation, says he is convinced that Ba'asyir was a "teacher and inspiration" to the bombers. Pastika says Ba'asyir, who has not been connected to the Bali bombings, will go on trial for immigration violations. While Ba'asyir's role in J.I. is still being investigated, linking J.I. with al-Qaeda does not sit well with many Indonesian politicians.