Badan Intelijen Negara, (State Intelligence Agency), commonly referred to as BIN, is Indonesia's primary intelligence agency. Prior to 2001, it was known as Bakin (Badan Koordinasi Intelijen Negara - State Intelligence Coordinating Agency); its name was changed as part of a general restructuring of the agency. BIN is responsible both for coordinating information sharing and operations between Indonesia's other intelligence agencies and for mounting operations on its own.
At the time of its name change in 2001, BIN's role in coordinating was deemphasized, but, in the wake of the 2002 Bali bombing, that aspect of the agency's operations was the subject of renewed focus as part of an all-around expansion of the agency's budget and operations.
BIN has been the subject of criticism from human rights groups for its treatment of dissidents and human rights advocates in Indonesia.
The agency is currently headed by Lieutenant General Marciano Norman, as of October 19, 2011; led before by Sutanto from October 21, 2009 to October 19, 2011, Syamsir Siregar from 2004 to 2009, and led by Abdullah Mahmud Hendropriyono from 2001 to 2004.
Famous quotes containing the words indonesian, state, intelligence and/or agency:
“The inference is, that God has restated the superiority of the West. God always does like that when a thousand white people surround one dark one. Dark people are always “bad” when they do not admit the Divine Plan like that. A certain Javanese man who sticks up for Indonesian Independence is very lowdown by the papers, and suspected of being a Japanese puppet.”
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“It is not, truly speaking, the labour that is divided; but the men: divided into mere segments of men—broken into small fragments and crumbs of life, so that all the little piece of intelligence that is left in a man is not enough to make a pin, or a nail, but exhausts itself in making the point of a pin or the head of a nail.”
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“It is possible that the telephone has been responsible for more business inefficiency than any other agency except laudanum.... In the old days when you wanted to get in touch with a man you wrote a note, sprinkled it with sand, and gave it to a man on horseback. It probably was delivered within half an hour, depending on how big a lunch the horse had had. But in these busy days of rush-rush-rush, it is sometimes a week before you can catch your man on the telephone.”
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