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JAKARTA - Indonesian police on Monday dismissed a media report saying that Islamist extremists were planning to assassinate US President Barack Obama when he visits the country.
National police chief Bambang Hendarso Danuri said analyst Dynno Chressbon, the Indonesian source quoted in the Western news agency's report, had no right to make what he described as unsubstantiated comments.
He said police knew of no Islamist plot to assassinate Obama, who is expected to visit the mainly Muslim country later this year.
"As if there's a bomb being prepared for the arrival of the US president -- that has never existed. What observer is bold enough to say something like that?" Danuri told a news conference.
"I stress... there's no such thing. The national police and our related agencies conduct research and evaluate such things. We don't use any other 'observers' to uncover terrorist plots.
"Dynno Chressbon had no business (making such statements) -- there's no such thing," said Danuri, who was briefing reporters on efforts to crack down Islamist extremism after deadly hotel blasts in Jakarta last month.
Chressbon was unavailable to respond to the police chief's comments. His phone was either switched off or he hung up saying he could not hear the caller when contacted by AFP.
In the news agency report on August 20, he was described as an "expert" from the Indonesian Center for Intelligence and National Security "who is close to the police investigations".
Other security analysts have disputed his claims that snipers planned to assassinate Obama as he left Jakarta's main international airport, saying for instance that the US president would land at a more secure military facility.
Obama is expected to visit Indonesia, where he lived for some years as a child, on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Singapore in November.
- AFP/ir
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