Jakarta: A suspected militant was critically injured when a bomb apparently being prepared for a terrorist attack exploded in a house near Indonesia’s capital, police said on Sunday.
An elite anti-terror squad was searching for the two men who escaped after the strong blast late Saturday in Depok, a town on the outskirts of Jakarta, said National Police spokesman Maj Gen Anang Iskandar.
“The president has ordered the hunt for the two suspects who fled the blast scene, and that’s what we are doing.” National Police chief Gen Timur Pradopo said the two suspects were severely wounded in their hands, and he warned the public to be on the lookout for anyone with such injuries.
Iskandar said police at the site found a badly injured man whose left hand had been cut off. Bomb-making devices were found scattered around him. “We suspect he was making bombs when one of them detonated prematurely,” Capt Agus Widodo, a local police chief in Depok, told reporters at the scene. “His condition is critical. We cannot talk to him.” The house had been rented for the past month and was listed as an orphanage foundation office and herbal clinic, but was never opened to the public.
Police questioned five people living near the house, including two injured men and a woman with slight wounds to her head. They said they saw two men flee on a motorbike just after the blast, and that one managed to jump a fence even though he appeared wounded, Widodo said. (AP)