Ex-SAS shocked at condition of hostage tycoon

By MATHEW DEARNALEY

Hardened former SAS warriors who snatched a Chinese Indonesian business tycoon from years of captivity in a Javanese village were shocked by the state in which they found him.

Johnson Cornelius Lo, who claims to be heir to a huge financial empire built on sugar and Tiger Balm, is recovering in a secret hideaway in Auckland after being found wasting away in solitary confinement.

An invitation through an Australian contact to rescue him went to principals of Onix International, an Auckland security company whose contracts include guarding the America's Cup.

Onix managing director Ken Whatuira, who fought in the Gulf War with the British SAS, is believed to have flown with an associate to Indonesia last September to meet trustees of Mr Lo's fortune and negotiate his release.

They were shocked to find him emaciated, a victim of physical and psychological abuse, after being held for five years in a tiny room in a central Javanese village by gangsters led by a corrupt local police official.

Attempts to free funds to meet a ransom demand are understood to have fallen through because of tight controls on his bank accounts in Indonesia and Hong Kong, and prevarication by middlemen.

Top officials of Indonesia's new Government are said to have become concerned about Mr Lo's plight but were too preoccupied with the country's political upheaval to intervene.

Mr Lo's trustees gave Onix approval to summon reinforcements from New Zealand in November to pluck him out of the village.

Using observations of Mr Whatuira and his associate, John Hauraki, eight former SAS soldiers spent a week at Onix's New Lynn base rehearsing a rescue plan after building a mock-up of the house where Mr Lo was held.

They then flew to Java by commercial aircraft through Brisbane and Bali, before buying two sports utility vehicles and driving to the village at night.

Donning balaclavas and armed with batons in case of resistance by Mr Lo's four guards, they took less than a minute to snatch him from the guards' grasp, even though more than a dozen villagers rallied around.

Mr Whatuira was guarded about discussing the operation, but insisted no firearms were involved and that his men took care to ensure no innocent bystanders were hurt.

"There was no collateral damage, either physically or structurally, and that was vitally important," the former SAS sergeant said before flying to Christchurch to supervise security for today's America's Cup parade.

"Because I had no legal rights there ... we couldn't just whack someone.

"The only people doing anything illegal were the four people holding him."

Asked whether any of Mr Lo's captors were hurt, he said one man who stood in the way was "just basically pushed aside."

Mr Whatuira was reluctant to identify the village, other than to say it was somewhere in Central Java, but it is believed to be about an hour's drive from Yogyakarta.

He strongly denied a suggestion in the Independent business weekly that Mr Lo was snatched from East Timor, under the noses of New Zealand peacekeeping soldiers.

"We would never do anything to embarrass our troops," said Mr Whatuira, a former New Zealand SAS man who spent 10 years until 1997 with the legendary British 22 SAS squadron.

Mr Lo is understood to have been issued with a visitor's permit, now extended for several months, under an Indonesian name different from his Chinese family name.

But his hosts say there is nothing untoward about this, as all Chinese must go by Indonesian names for official purposes, and that he is in New Zealand legitimately.

Mr Whatuira said the emphasis was on rehabilitating him after his years in captivity, and that he was being well looked after until he was fit enough to travel and gain access to funds to pay for the operation.

Another seasoned former SAS trooper involved in the operation said: "At the end of the day it came down to one of being kind to a human being."