Four injured in fresh Poso blast
Ruslan Sangadji, The Jakarta Post, Poso
The peace was again shattered in the Central Sulawesi city of Poso on Saturday night when a homemade bomb exploded injuring four people.
The bomb went off outside a house on Jl. Mongonsidi, Lawanga subdistrict, Poso city, at 11:15 p.m., causing panic among members of the public, but they nevertheless managed to assist the victims, taking the injured to Poso General Hospital for treatment.
The victims -- Sinta, 44; Selvi, 28; Ical, 19; and Fudin, 24 -- suffered only slight injuries caused by flying fragments and were released from the hospital soon after receiving treatment.
The Central Sulawesi and Poso Police's bomb squad, led by Poso Police chief Adj. Sr. Comr. M. Soleh Hidayat, arrived soon after the explosion and immediately sealed off the area.
The motive behind the bombing is still unclear, Soleh said, but said it bore all the hallmarks of a terrorist attack. Several witnessed have been questioned by the police but no arrests have been made so far.
"I can't provide detailed information right now but I can say that it looks like a terror attack was perpetrated on Saturday night," he said.
The bomb exploded just moments after revelers finished performing the controversial Dero folk dance at a birthday party outside a resident's house located opposite the residence of Poso regency secretary Awad Alamri.
One victim, Fudin, said the alarm was first raised by another victim, Selvi, who saw sparks coming out of a package. Fudin attempted to sound the warning but the bomb exploded before people could flee.
The Dero dance is controversial in the region. Regularly performed in the past during local ceremonies like weddings and birthday parties, as well as harvest ceremonies, it was never performed in Poso between 1998 and late 2004 following its prohibition by several hard-line Muslim groups.
The groups banned the dance, claiming it was haram (against Islamic teachings), as it was performed by men and women holding hands. In traditional Islam, only men and women who are muhrim (related and who cannot get married), may hold hands.
Saturday's explosion was the first in Poso since newly elected Poso regent Piet Inkiriwang and deputy regent Abdul Muthalib were officially installed two weeks ago.
Poso has been a flash point of sectarian clashes between Muslims and Christians that left over 1,000 people dead in two years of bloodshed up to 2001.
Up to August of this year, at least four bombs -- two of them in Poso city -- had exploded, with the bombings at Tentena market in May this year being the deadliest in Indonesia since the Bali bombings of 2002 that killed 202 people.
In May, two bombs ripped through the crowded market in the predominantly Christian area of Tentena, killing 21 civilians and injuring 70 others.