http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2009/07/200971813225334836.html
Saturday, July 18, 2009
19:16 Mecca time, 16:16 GMT
Jakarta blasts: JI leader suspected
Noordin Top is wanted in connection with several
bomb attacks in Indonesia [File, EPA]
A former leader of Jemaah Islamiyah, the armed Islamist group, is
suspected by security officials of being behind the suicide bombings on two
hotels in Indonesia that have left nine people dead.
"Yesterday's attacks on the Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotel were 100 per
cent handled and controlled by Noordin Mohammed Top," Surya Dharma, the former
head of Indonesia's anti-terror intelligence force, said on Saturday.
Five foreign nationals - three Australians, a New Zealander and a
Singaporean - were among the nine dead in Friday's bombings. More than 50
people were injured.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera, he said there was
evidence pointing to Malaysian-born Top being behind the attacks.
Dharma tracked Noordin for six years until his intelligence unit was
dismantled by the Indonesian government.
Civilians targeted
Ansyaad Mbai, Indonesia's security ministry's anti-terror desk chief,
also blamed Noordin, whose group broke-away from Jemaah Islamiyah after an
alleged falling out with the group's leadership over the targeting of civilians.
In depth
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Timeline: Indonesia bombings
"There are strong indications that Noordin Top's group is behind the
attacks because the bombs were hand-made and the tactic was suicide bombings,"
Mbai said, adding they have been methods used by Top in the past.
The suicide bombings at the hotels in the Indonesia capital are the
fourth attacks allegedly masterminded by Noordin in the country.
He is thought to have been behind the attacks on the Jakarta Marriott in
2003, the Australian embassy in 2004 and on a series of restaurants in Bali in
2005 in which more than 20 people were killed.
Sidney Jones, of the International Crisis Group, told Al Jazeera that one
of the prime suspects "has to be Noordin Top".
"The police were actively looking for him just last week in a town in
central Java where they found explosives similar to those used in the hotels
[attacks]," she said.
Maximum devastation
"They have been close on the trail of some of these people in the past
and I am sure we will see a wave of arrests in the aftermath of this bombing."
The equipment found in the raid last week on an Islamic boarding school
in Central Java, carried out as part of the hunt for Noordin, was said by
police to be the same as those used in Friday's attack.
The bombs are thought to have been brought fully assembled into the
hotels, despite airport-style security measures and were packed with nails,
ball-bearings, nuts and bolts to maximise the devastation.
Police said the bombs were "identical" to ones previously used in Jemaah
Islamiyah (JI) attacks, but the group has denied involvement in the recent
attacks.
Foreigners killed
Jibril, a long-time member of JI, told Al Jazeera that his organisation
was not involved in the attacks.
"JI is an organisation with a very clear goal - we don't fight against an
enemy who is not targeting Muslims," he told Al Jazeera.
"Indonesia is not a country attacking Muslims, so we don't commit attacks
here."
Investigators are sifting through body parts and other forensic evidence,
attempting to identify the bombers involved in the attacks.
Police say there were three suicide bombers involved in the attack, and
DNA evidence, including a severed head, are under examination.
The bombers are said to have posed as guests at the hotels, checking in
two days before the attacks.
Security increased
Security video from the hotel shows a man with a suitcase and backpack
entering the hotel restaurant shortly before an explosion.
Police have not confirmed whether the man is a suspect.
Over 50 people, many of them foreigners,
were wounded in the attack [AFP]
Speaking to Al Jazeera, the head of security at the Marriott said: "We
had two security officers who saw this man ... carrying a big back pack on [his
front].
"[When questioned] he said I'm going to see my boss ... [but] couldn't
come up with the name and he just kept walking.
"He moved forward five metres and the bomb detonated."
General Bambang Hendarso Danuri, Indonesia's national police chief,
called on hotels and shopping malls across the mainly Muslim archipelago of 234
million people to raise their security protocols in response to the bombings.
The attacks triggered the cancellation of a planned Manchester United
friendly against an Indonesian All-Star team scheduled for Monday, a decision
that caused great dismay among football fans in Indonesia.
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