Police inch closer to Azahari's inner circle<\/p>\n
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta\/Bandung\/Surabaya<\/p>\n
Police said on Friday the manhunt for the perpetrators of the
\nSept. 9 blast outside the Australian Embassy would soon bear
\nfruit with the arrest of alleged accomplices of Malaysian bomb
\nexperts Azahari bin Husin and Noordin Moh. Top.<\/p>\n
National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar said investigators
\nhad arrested more people in two locations in the western part of
\nJava and North Jakarta, who were alleged to have helped prepare
\nthe explosives used in the bomb attack and to have harbored the
\nMalaysian fugitives.<\/p>\n
\"They were not directly involved in the bombing. For example,
\nthey admitted they knew the packages they were moving from one
\nplace to another were explosives. They also confessed they were
\nwith Azahari right before the explosion,\" Da'i said.<\/p>\n
Azahari and Noordin are believed to have masterminded the 2002
\nBali bombings that killed 202 people, the JW Marriott Hotel
\nattack in Jakarta that claimed 12 lives and last week's blast
\nthat left at least 10 people dead, including one of the
\nperpetrators.<\/p>\n
Entering the second week of the investigation, the police have
\narrested 21 people, but one of them, Agung, has been released due
\nto lack of evidence.<\/p>\n
A police source said the latest arrests were four people in
\nBandung, one in the Central Java town of Surakarta, one in
\nBanten, four in Lampung and two in a slum area in North Jakarta.<\/p>\n
He said that the two men detained in North Jakarta were
\nbelieved to have harbored Azahari and Noordin, and to have helped
\nthe Malaysians transport the explosives used in last week's
\nbombing.<\/p>\n
However, he would not identify those the detained persons.<\/p>\n
\"After leaving Cengkareng, both Azahari and Noordin moved to
\ndensely populated areas such as those in North Jakarta because
\nnobody there would be suspicious of newcomers,\" he said.<\/p>\n
The source said that after multiple arrests the police were
\nnow concentrating their manhunt on West Java, including Bandung
\nand Cirebon.<\/p>\n
\"We came to this conclusion after every place we searched
\noutside West Java revealed nothing,\" he said.<\/p>\n
Da'i warned that the bomb attacks would likely continue as the
\npolice still did not know whether the explosives detonated last
\nweek were the last that the terror suspects had.<\/p>\n
\"We don't know yet whether Azahari has made only one bomb. We
\ncan't stop the threat of bombs unless we capture Azahari and
\nNoordin. The latter is an expert in persuading people to become
\nsuicide bombers,\" said Da'i.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, West Java Police said they had readied hundreds of
\nofficers to help the team from National Police Headquarters in
\nhunting down Azahari, Noordin and the other suspected bombers.<\/p>\n
West Java Police chief Insp. Gen. Edi Darnadi said he had
\ndeployed at least 20 detectives from his department and hundreds
\nof detectives from police precincts across the province to search
\nvarious areas, including Garut, Tasikmalaya, Ciamis and Banjar.<\/p>\n
\"We are still concentrating on these areas. We can't say
\nanything yet, otherwise the suspects will get wind of what we're
\ndoing,\" said Edi.<\/p>\n
The provincial police have distributed 10,000 fliers and
\npictures of the alleged embassy bombers across West Java.<\/p>\n
East Java Police have also deployed additional personnel to
\ncapture Sulaiman, the teacher of Rahmatullah, who was arrested in
\nSidoarjo on Wednesday for his alleged links to Azahari. Sulaiman
\nand two other men escaped police capture following the arrest of
\nRahmatullah.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/police-inch-closer-to-azaharis-inner-circle-1447893297",
"image": ""
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
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