Jakarta to launch antiterror guidebook

Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The city administration is to launch an antiterror guidebook on Monday in an effort to improve people's awareness of possible terrorist activities in their neighborhood.

Governor Sutiyoso said on Friday the book which consists of practical tips would be distributed to all neighborhood communities in the city so that they could detect any terrorist activities in the early stages.

"The most important thing is that we want to introduce the public to activities which may be conducted by terrorists. In short, we want to improve public awareness in intelligence gathering," Sutiyoso who is a former Jakarta military commander, told the media at City Hall on Friday.

City spokesman Muhayat said 3,500 copies of the book would be released on Monday and 35,000 copies would be available in the near future.

Muhayat said that the books would be distributed free of charge to all communities including neighborhood units, community units, private offices and government offices.

He said security officers in public places, such as in shopping malls, hotels and hospitals, would also be given the books.

The book was prepared by the Indonesian Antiterrorist Society (M-pati), an NGO which raised funds to finance the book, he said.

He refused to mention how much the book cost to produce, but stressed that the fund was not taken from the city budget.

The launching of the book follows the bomb blast at the JW Marriott Hotel in South Jakarta on Aug. 5 which killed 12 people and wounded 147 others.

Many blamed the police's poor intelligence skills for not being able to predict and prevent the bombing.

Besides improving public skills on intelligence matters, Sutiyoso earlier planned to ask military officers to safeguard public places.

Observers criticized the governor's idea as the military officers might frighten visitors away from public places.