The Sydney Morning Herald, September 24 2002
Bungled Jakarta bombing backs US warnings
By Matthew Moore, Herald Correspondent in Jakarta
The bungled bombing of a United States embassy residence in Jakarta early
yesterday has provided dramatic evidence supporting US warnings that its citizens
are under threat from terrorists operating in Indonesia.
The attempted bombing of the house in a leafy suburban street just after 3.30am killed
an Indonesian man police believe was about to throw the bomb from the front seat of
his car.
After the bomb exploded 20 metres from the house, the car crashed at low speed into
a concrete rubbish container in front of the residence, believed to be occupied by two
US embassy staff.
Security officers sitting in their guardhouse 30 metres from the embassy house
chased and caught one of the three young men in the late model, locally made Toyota
Kijang who ran off when their car crashed.
Police found an identity card in the vehicle and searched two houses in Bogor, about
60 kilometres from Jakarta, where, they said, they found a cache of arms.
Indonesia's chief of police, General D'ai Bachtiar, said police found two sticks of TNT,
two pistols and 100 bullets in one of the houses.
The attempted bombing comes three days after the US embassy warned of a
"credible threat" against Westerners in the city of Yogyakarta, and less than a
fortnight after the US closed its embassy because of threats of an al-Qaeda bomb
attack.
Indonesian politicians, including the Vice-President, Hamzah Haz, and moderate
Muslim leaders, have until now been sceptical of US claims of a threat against the US
or Westerners stemming from information provided by an Arab known as Omar
al-Faruq, arrested in Indonesia in June and sent to the US. He said al-Qaeda was
responsible for bomb attacks on Indonesian churches over Christmas 2000, in which
18 people died, and for attempting to assassinate President Megawati Sukarnoputri in
a bungled bombing.
Yesterday's bombing appeared to be the first attack against a US Government facility
in Indonesia in recent times, although it was unclear whether al-Qaeda was involved.
The US embassy said yesterday that there were "no indications that the US embassy
or US interests were targeted". Rick Skarompis, who lives next door to the house that
police say was targeted, woke when he heard the explosion, and ball bearings
smashed lights in his garden and broke a window in a bedroom.
He drove off to notify police and returned to find a man whose leg had been blown off
sitting next to the car.
"The one we saw was still alive when we saw him. He got out of the car and sat there
till he bled to death about 1 or two hours later."
Police later identified him as Abdullah Haziz, whom they said was aged 28, although
media reports said he was 35.
Mr Skarompis said he and the local guards were certain the bombers had targeted his
neighbours.
He said guards had seen the car park nearby, and its occupants waited 20 minutes
before driving down the street towards the US house, which has a barbed wire-topped
fence higher than any others in the street.
Mr Skarompis said his neighbours had diplomatic corps number plates, which would
have made their house easier to identify as a US embassy house
Every three hours US security forces patrol the street. The occupants did not emerge
from the house after the explosion, he said.
Copyright © 2002. The Sydney Morning Herald.
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