Bomb attempt foiled in Palu

Palu, CENTRAL SULAWESI: The Central Sulawesi Police bomb squad defused a bomb at the Hasanuddin shopping center in Palu on Monday morning.

The bomb was discovered at about 4 a.m. after a scavenger reported a suspicious plastic bag to the shopping center's security guard, who contacted the police.

The chief of the provincial police's Mobile Brigade, Adj. Sr. Comr. Saiful Bahri, confirmed the bomb plot and said the homemade explosive had been defused.

He said the police were investigating the motive for the thwarted attack and the possible culprits.

There have been four bombings in the provincial capital over the last two months. A major blast occurred on July 17 in the Pantai Penghibur recreation park, destroying a cafe. There were no fatalities. --Antara

Smuggling of tortoises foiled

Surabaya, EAST JAVA: About 1,600 tortoises of various species were seized by the police on Monday at Surabaya's Tanjung Priok Port before they were smuggled to Riau.

Rosek Nursahid, the head of KSBK, a nonprofit wildlife protection institute, said on Monday the tortoises were being loaded onto a motorboat for delivery to Riau via Banjarmasin, West Kalimantan, when they were seized.

Seven hundred of the tortoises are unprotected species, 650 internationally protected and the rest are partly protected by Law No. 5/1990 on the conservation of biological resources.

Yellow-necked tortoises, though legally tradable, can be sold only with permits from the Convention of International Trade in Endangered Species and the provincial National Resources Conservation Center.

"The confiscated tortoises should be released into rivers in conservation zones in order to better guarantee their survival," added Rosek Nursahid. --Antara

Luxury cars from S'pore seized in Batam

Batam, RIAU: The customs authority in Batam, Riau, is holding 152 used luxury cars that entered the country illegally from Singapore, and is seeking a way to reexport them.

Informed sources told Antara on Monday that a lot of stolen cars from Thailand and Malaysia, mostly sedans, were sent to Batam through illegal terminals in Singapore.

Batam customs officials, meanwhile, said they could not yet set a date to reexport the vehicles to Singapore, which tended to refuse the indirect import of used vehicles.

At present, about 200 more vehicles are reportedly ready to enter Batam from Singapore, but have been prevented from doing so following an outcry in the media. Batam has banned the import of used cars from Singapore since April 2002. --Antara