Achmad Supriyanto testified at the South Jakarta District Court on Friday that he had sent 10 families to Syria to help Adi Jihadi, a man who admitted to having channeled funds for the suicide bomb attack on Jl. MH Thamrin in Central Jakarta that left eight people dead, including five of the suspected terrorists.

Adi has previously testified in the court.

Supriyanto said the families had paid themselves for their flights to Syria, while he had been in charge of buying the tickets.

The families had left for Syria as part of their hijrah, an Islamic born-again movement inspired by the path of the Prophet Muhammad, he said.

“They [the families] went to Syria to save their religion. The sharia is enforced perfectly there,” said Supriyanto, adding that the enforcement was thanks to Syria and Iraq being controlled by the leader of the Islamic State (IS), Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi.

“The people who went were advised by two men named Abu Rizky and Abu Muhammad in Syria. Abu Rizky contacted me via Telegram,” said Supriyanto, noting that the defendant in the case, radical cleric Aman Abdurrahman, had not known about the departures.

Aman was convicted on a number of terrorism charges, including the mobilization of people through preaching.

Supriyanto further confessed that he had received orders to buy weapons from the Philippines along with Adi but did not know where the orders had come from.

The two men were in the neighboring country for military training and used the guns as part of the training. (jlm)

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