Homemade bomb rocks hospital in Yogyakarta

Homemade bomb rocks hospital in Yogyakarta

YOGYAKARTA (JP): An explosion jolted the state-run Dr.
Sardjito General Hospital here at around 1 a.m. on Tuesday,
injuring a security guard and damaging a lavatory near the
hospital's morgue

The explosion caused a hole measuring about 35 centimeter long
25 cm wide and 7.5 cm deep in the lavatory's floor.

Waridjan, a 55-year-old Army warrant officer who is chief of
the hospital's security guard unit suffered eye injuries when
glass fragments from the lavatory's window hit his eyes. The
explosion has made him partially deaf.

He has been placed in the intensive care unit. His right arm
was also injured in the explosion.

Beside Waridjan, two other hospital security guards, Triyono
and Giman, a visitor Dwi Purwati, and three other people are
being questioned by the police over the explosion.

Supt. Ahmad Riharto, who led the forensic team examining the
explosion, said he was not yet able to determine the type of
explosive used but was certain it was handmade. He said there was
a strong smell of sulfur at the blast site.

The forensic team also found a piece of damaged battery,
believed to have been used to trigger the bomb.

"Judging from the explosion, I can say that the bomb was made
by someone who has adequate knowledge in explosives," said Ahmad.

The Yogyakarta Police's Mobile Brigade bomb squad assumed,
however, that the chemicals used in the bomb are the same as that
used in firecrackers.

"Therefore, I am certain there are only a few people behind
the bombing," said Yogyakarta Police chief Brig. Gen. Logan
Siagian.

"A group of people who do not want peace to exist in the
country could be behind this," he added.

According to Logan, forensic laboratory tests would be
conducted soon with help from the Central Java Police Forensic
Laboratory in Semarang.

Last Wednesday two active handmade bombs were found on a road
in Masahan area in Trirenggo village in the regency of Bantul.
Another bomb was found in a city bus last Friday after the Panti
Rapih Catholic Hospital received bomb threats over the telephone.

The story

Waridjan said that at 12:45 p.m. the hospital's emergency unit
informed him that a strange object, suspected to be a handmade
bomb, had been found in a lavatory close to the morgue

Accompanied by the two fellow security guards, Waridjan went
to the lavatory to investigate.

He said he saw a tube resembling a thermos flask of about 30cm
long in a corner of the lavatory. "The object was wrapped in
newspaper and had a blue plastic cap on it."

Curious on whether it was a bomb, Waridjan picked a fist-sized
stone and threw it at the object. "I threw it twice but missed. I
then used a wooden stick to move it. The object rolled and then a
deafening sound was heard."

"I quickly lied on the floor with my face down. Thank God I'm
still alive. The explosion has made me partially deaf," Waridjan
told The Jakarta Post from the hospital.

In a separate interview, Yogyakarta Governor Sultan
Hamengkubuwono X said there were people who were creating unrest
in Yogyakarta.

He said two weeks ago, when he was in Jakarta, he was informed
that three provocateurs from Banyuwangi (East Java) and 10 others
from Jakarta had been sent to Yogyakarta to create chaos.

"I reported what I heard to the Yogyakarta Police," he said,
adding that four days later bombs were discovered on the road in
Bantul and in a city bus. (swa)