Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir walked out of his terrorism trial in Indonesia on Thursday to protest the reading of a witness interrogation identifying him as the leader of a group linked with al Qaeda. The 66-year old cleric is accused of heading the Jemaah Islamiah group, blamed for a string of bombings, including the 2002 Bali night-club blasts that killed 202 people.
About one hour into the court session, Bashir, wearing a white shirt and Muslim skullcap, joined his lawyer in a walkout to protest against the reading without the witness present.
"If the defence lawyer walks out, I'm not willing to be investigated in this trial without a lawyer," Bashir said before calmly leaving the court.
His lawyer, Mohammad Asegaf, told the court: "With all due respect to this court, we are withdrawing ourselves from this trial."
Bashir, who has been jailed during the trial, and his lawyer sat in a nearby room in the court complex while the trial continued. They returned later for the end of the session.
The police report read by the prosecutor was of a witness who said that Bashir had taken over the leadership of Jemaah Islamiah after the death of its founder.
Prosecutors have accused Bashir of using his "religious charisma" to incite bomb attacks on the resort island of Bali in 2002 and also a suicide blast outside the JW Marriott Hotel in Jakarta in 2003 that killed 12.
The cleric has consistently denied wrongdoing, saying the charges against him are a result of Western pressure.
At last week's session, Ali Imron, serving a life sentence for his role in the Bali blasts testified Bashir had nothing to do with that attack in the latest in a series of setbacks to the prosecution's case against the cleric.
This month, a former interpreter for US President George W. Bush testified that Washington had pressed Indonesia to secretly detain and hand over the cleric before the Bali bombings.
Bashir's defence lawyers had called the witness, Frederick Burns, to bolster their contention that Bashir's trial is politically motivated and the charges against him are a result of US pressure.
A previous effort after the Bali bombings to convict him of leading Jemaah Islamiah failed.
The cleric did, however, serve 18 months for immigration violations and was re-arrested using anti-terror statutes in April.
The new trial began in October. If found guilty, Bashir could be sentenced to death. Some security experts see Jemaah Islamiah as al Qaeda's Southeast Asian wing.