Explosion in Nganjuk linked to Laskar Jihad?
SURABAYA (JP): Police here were thinking on Wednesday that the grenade that exploded on Tuesday in a van in Nganjuk, some 130 kilometers to the southwest belonged to the Yogyakarta-based Laskar Jihad (Jihad Force) Ahlus Sunnah wal Jamaah.
In a related development, Yogyakarta Police went on Thursday to Mulungan subdistrict in Sleman north of Yogyakarta and searched the rented house of Rifzikka Helta, one of the passengers who died in the blast. Two kilograms of gunpowder were discovered during the search.
East Java Police Chief of Detectives Col. Suharto said on Wednesday that apart from pieces of the Belgian-made grenade, a home-made bomb, hundreds of 5.56 millimeter bullets for M-16 rifles, and a large number of other bullets of calibers ranging from 6.3 mm to 9 mm, were in the Suzuki van when it exploded.
He said the lethal supplies could be leftover from weaponry smuggled through the Tanjung Perak seaport and might have been kept for a long time in Surabaya before being transported to Yogyakarta.
Suharto said Nganjuk police also discovered several hand written and printed documents, one of which contains a call for people to join the jihad force and raise funds for the jihad movement in Maluku. Partly burned account books from state bank BNI and Bank Central Asia (BCA) belonging to Rifzikka were found in the wreckage.
The second passenger killed in the blast has been identified as Nasruddin and the injured passenger is Azmi Ishaq, 32, a student of the Al Ikhlas Islamic Boarding School (Pesantren) in Jember, East Java. Azmi is in critical condition at Nganjuk state hospital. Another survivor, identified as Wiji, is still at large.
The cause of the explosion remains a mystery, but Suharto is assuming that overheating might have caused the blast.
The wreckage of the van was transported to Surabaya on Wednesday for forensic investigation.
When asked if the four passengers were members of the Laskar Jihad of Ahlus Sunnah wal Jamaah Communication Forum, Suharto said: "We found such documents. We are going to probe more thoroughly."
But chief of the Jihad force communication forum Ayip Syafruddin denied on Thursday that the four passengers were members of the Muslim organization. He said the organization could not afford to buy ammunition and weapons.
"We just don't have enough money. How could we buy those things?" Ayip said.
A joint team comprising Yogyakarta and East Java police has been formed to probe the incident.
Yogyakarta Police Chief of Detectives Lt. Col. Totok Sunyoto told The Jakarta Post on Thursday that Helta's sister, Rifkizzia Silvia, admitted that the car that exploded in Nganjuk was hers. Silvia said Helta borrowed the car on Tuesday for unknown purposes.
Local police chief Col. Dadang Sutrisno could not be reached for confirmation.
Silvia said the burial of Helta has been rescheduled for Saturday, pending completion of the autopsy.
Yogyakarta Governor Hamengku Buwono X met with Dadang on Wednesday and said afterward he regretted the grenade blast which involved residents from the province.
"They were heading for Yogyakarta when the explosion took place. What on earth were they going to do with the hazardous explosives here?"
The trauma of bomb blasts continued to plague North Sumatra on Wednesday when residents of Pancurbatu district in Deliserdang, near the provincial capital of Medan panicked after finding a box they believed to be a bomb.
But Medan Police Chief Col. Hasyim Irianto said that the box, weighing one kilogram, was a temperature measurement device belonging to the local Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG) office.
The Japanese-made device carried aloft by balloons shocked residents when several balloons were heard to explode. (39/44/jun/nur/sur)