The Jakarta Post, 4/1/2004 6:21:07 PM
Police arrest three suspected of planting Medan supermarket
bombs
JAKARTA (AP): Authorities have arrested three suspects in connection with the
discovery of five bombs in an Indonesian supermarket this month, police said on
Thursday.
They were captured on Wednesday in Medan, the provincial capital of North Sumatra,
said National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. Sunarko Ardanto.
Sunarko declined to provide give further information about the detainees, saying
detectives were still searching for the other suspects.
Police have questioned 20 witnesses since the explosive devices were found March 8
near the Medan Mall Supermarket's main entrance, he said.
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has provided Indonesian police with
technical assistance for the investigation, but Sunarko said the officers had yet to
determine where the explosives came from.
Police in Medan, about 1,400 kilometers northwest of the capital, Jakarta, also
defused two homemade bombs in a market in January, a day after a small bomb
exploded in the city but caused no casualties.
The police connected the January find with the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) guerrillas,
who have been fighting for the independence of nearby Aceh province since 1976.
Police offered no proof for their assertions.
Suspicion also has fallen on criminal gangs who often plant bombs to intimidate rivals
or to extort protection payments from shop owners.
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