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onvicted terrorist leader Abu Bakar Ba’asyir was given a three-month sentence reduction on Independence Day, an official said on Wednesday. “This is the second year he [Ba’asyir] has been granted an Independence Day remission,” said the corrections office chief of the West Java Justice and Human Rights Agency, Agus Toyib, in Bandung, as reported by news agency Antara.

Ba’asyir had fulfilled administrative requirements for remission, such as having served one-third of his sentence and cooperating as a justice collaborator, he added.

Ba’asyir, the spiritual leader of Islamic organization Jamaah Ansharut Tauhid (JAT), was sentenced to 15 years in prison in 2011 after the South Jakarta District Court declared him guilty of funding a military training camp for a terrorist group in Aceh. He filed for a review of his case, which the Supreme Court rejected in August.

After serving time in a high-security prison on Nusakambangan Island in Cilacap, Central Java, the ministry moved Ba’asyir to the Gunung Sindur penitentiary in Bogor, West Java, in April over health concerns for the frail 77-year-old. The firebrand Muslim cleric was among 11,010 inmates in West Java granted remissions on Independence Day. (rin)