Deputy Home Minister Chor Chee Heung said today that initial investigations revealed that the13 Malaysian students arrested in Pakistan are 'future leaders' of the regional terror network Jemaah Islamiah (JI).

"According to information gathered by the Malaysian police, these students are all believed to be JI members and a group of them are groomed to take over the JI leadership," he told reporters at the Parliament lobby this morning.

He said that the police are still investigating their family members and that some personnel may be sent to Pakistan to assist in further investigation.

The government, he said, had informed the family members of the 13, majority of whom are sons of JI members.

"They are all private students and not sponsored by the government. The group received their early education at Ma'had Tarbiyah Islamiah Luqman Al-Hakim (a religious school based in Johor)," he said.

Apart from the 13 Malaysians, two other Indonesian students were also arrested in the pre-dawn raid on Sept 20 at three religious schools and hostels in Karachi - the port city of 14 million where hundreds of al-Qaeda operatives are believed to be in hiding.

Recently, terrorism experts had expressed concerns on the emergence of al-Qaeda's "third generation" of terrorists who want to emulate and surpass what have been achieved by their predecessors.

The experts point out that JI and al-Qaeda have the ability to regenerate itself with unknown characters and personalities which will make it harder to detect activity and predict behaviour.

Tracing 273 JI members

Earlier in the Dewan Rakyat, Chor disclosed that the police have identified 192 JI members and were still tracking down about 273 others.

Chor said that the whereabouts of these wanted persons are unknown.

Of those already identified, 60 are being held without trial under the Internal Security Act (ISA) at the Kamunting detention centre, while three others have been put under restricted residency.

Chor added that the police are still investigating one other person while five have been released unconditionally from their ISA arrest. He did not mention the status of the remaining 123 identified JI members.

However previously the Inspector-General of Police Norian Mai had said that about 200 JI members are being held in total in Malaysia.

Responding to a supplementary question from Chong Eng (DAP-Bukit Mertajam), Chor said the government is not ready to release a white paper on the JI probe as it might interfere with further police investigation.

To another question from Mohd Zin Mohamed (BN-Shah Alam), the deputy minister said 12 active radical Islamic groups were identified from 1967 to 2001 as groups which intended to "overthrow the ruling government via military means".

The most recent groups listed by the ministry are JI, al-Maunah and the Kumpulan Mujahidin Malaysia (KMM).

PAS implicated

Replying to a supplementary question from Mohd Zin later, Chor "implicated" PAS in the subversive activities.

"Whenever we touch on such matters concerning Islam, our friends in PAS are very unhappy... but the fact is most of the detainees involved in those unhealthy activities are found to be members of PAS, such as the son of (PAS spiritual leader) Nik Aziz Nik...," he said, leading to a protest from PAS MPs.

Nik Aziz's son, Nik Adli, were among the nine alleged Islamic militants slapped with a new two-year detention order on Tuesday. They have been held under the ISA for two years.

Chor said further detention was necessary as the nine have not "repented" and are still considered a threat to national security.