MAS SELAMAT CAPTURED!!!!!
SINGAPORE, May 8 -- Mas Selamat Kastari, the suspected leader of the Jemaah Islamiah militant group, who escaped from a Singapore detention centre here last year has been caught in Malaysia, according to local media reports today.The fugitive, who had been hunted on a massive scale by the city-state authorities since he slipped out of the Whitley Road detention centre on Feb 27, was captured on April 1 while hiding in Johor, The Straits Times said quoting sources.The report said Mas Selamat, 48, was nabbed in the outskirts of Johor Baharu and is now being held by the Malaysian authorities for interrogation.He was the alleged mastermind of a plot to hijack a plane and crash it into Singapore's Changi Airport.He fled Singapore in 2001 but was captured by the Indonesian police on Bintan island in 2006, and later repatriated to the city-state.The paper said a senior Malaysian government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, confirmed the arrest and said that Mas Selamat was being held under the country's Internal Security Act.However, the officer declined to say when the terrorist would be handed over to the Singapore authorities.The report also said that the terrorist was tracked down based on intelligence provided by Singapore's Internal Security Department, and a joint operation by Malaysia and Singapore's security agencies eventually led to his arrest.It is still not known how Mas Selamat slipped out of Singapore or when he entered Malaysia after the escape.The report said the fugitive had stayed in Johor all this time and had not travelled further north.The capture of Mas Selamat brings to an end one of the largest manhunts ever undertaken by Singapore for a terrorist on the run.
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