LAKSAMANA.Net, November 19, 2004 11:19 PM
Two Detained Over Poso Bombing
Laksamana.Net - Police have detained two men for questioning in connection with last
week’s bomb blast that killed six people in Poso, Central Sulawesi province.
The men, aged 25 and 28, were nabbed at 5.30am Friday (19/11/04). They have not
been charged yet but are being held under Indonesia’s anti-terror law.
"The anti-terror law entitles police to hold them for a week. They will be released if
nothing can be proven against them,” Poso Police chief Senior Commissioner Abdi
Dharma was quoted as saying by detikcom online news portal.
"We must follow the principle of the presumption of innocent until proven guilty. So far
they are still being held for questioning. We suspect the two men of involvement, but
we cannot yet be more definite until there is further investigation,” he said.
The November 13 bomb blast on a public passenger minivan outside a market in Poso
killed five women and one man. Two people injured in the attack remain hospitalized.
Dharma said police are now searching for three people, including two women,
suspected of involvement in the blast.
Witnesses have said they saw a man place explosives in the minivan, while two
women acted as lookouts.
"We will trace the link between the three to find out if they are part of a militant
group," Dharma was quoted as saying by Agence France-Presse.
The motive of the bombing remains unclear, but Coordinating Minister for Political,
Legal and Security Affairs Widodo Adisutjipto has described it as an act of terrorism.
The attack sparked fears of more violence in Poso, which has been the scene of
deadly sectarian conflict over the past four years.
Fierce communal clashes between Muslims and Christians in Poso and other
districts in Central Sulawesi left about 2,000 people dead over 2000-2002.
Much of the violence was blamed on Java-based militant Islamic group Laskar Jihad
and feuding factions of the Indonesian Defense Forces.
The government in December 2001 sponsored a peace deal that largely put an end to
the carnage, and Laskar Jihad disbanded after the October 2002 Bali nightclub
bombings. But sporadic killings and bombings have continued in Central Sulawesi,
mostly targeting Christians.
In October 2003, masked gunmen killed 13 Christian villagers in Morowali and Poso
districts. The International Crisis Group blamed the killings on a new local Islamic
militia group, Mujahidin KOMPAK, which it said emerged in Central Sulawesi as an
offshoot of regional terrorism network Jemaah Islamiyah. It said most of the attackers
were locally recruited men, who had family members killed in attacks on Muslims in
May-June 2000 and were probably motivated by revenge.
Over recent months there has been an increase in religious violence, including the
gunning down of a Christian preacher during a church service in July.
On November 4, a Christian village head in Poso was killed and decapitated. On
November 8, the driver of a public passenger minivan in the city was shot dead.
On October 21, a guard at Poso’s Bethany Church was shot dead. A week before
the church shooting, a Hindu woman was killed and two Christian men wounded when
a group of unidentified attackers opened fire on their houses. On the same day, two
Christian men were hacked to death by assailants wielding machetes in a rural
district south of the provincial capital Palu.
The killings have fueled speculation that shadowy forces are attempting to provoke a
return to large-scale religious violence in Central Sulawesi, possibly in an effort to
destabilize the presidency of Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who came to power on
October 20.
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