Men seen in van wanted for firecracker blast

JAKARTA (JP): South Jakarta Police are looking for a group of men in connection with a powerful firecracker blast on Wednesday inside a city bus parked in the vicinity of the trial venue of former president Soeharto.

Chief of the South Jakarta Police detectives unit Sr. Insp. Achmad Alwi quoted witnesses as saying on Thursday that a group of men in a Toyota Kijang van, with license plate number B 1237 ZD, was hanging around the area a minutes before the explosion.

"Shortly after the blast, the van sped away from the scene," Alwi quoted the witnesses as saying.

According to the officer, his men later found that the license plate did not belong to the van.

"It belongs to a Volkswagen Safari vehicle," Alwi said.

Separately, South Jakarta Police chief Sr. Supt. Edward Aritonang explained that, based on preliminary findings, someone must have got into the vacant bus parked in front of an auto repair shop to light the fuse of the firecrackers.

But he refused to give further details, saying that his men were probing the case.

Edward said the bundle of large firecrackers was placed behind the driver's seat.

"So far, we can say that the firecrackers did not belong to the bus driver, nor his conductor, both of whom have been named witnesses in the case," he said.

Separately, his deputy, Asst. Supt. F.F.J. Mirah, conceded that anyone could easily get into the empty bus and place explosives inside it since its two doors were left unlocked.

Alwi said seven witnesses had been questioned by Thursday.

No casualties were reported but the parked yellow Koantas Bima bus was seriously damaged, particularly the front part of the vehicle.

Locals described the blast, which shocked residents of Jl. Taman Margasatwa, as a "great thundering sound".

The bus driver, Bafri, told police interrogators that he had parked and left the bus, which normally plied the Kampung Rambutan-Lebak Bulus route, to get something to eat when the explosion occurred.

A police line had been placed around the site of the explosion. A group of people gathered for a look at the scene on Thursday.

Fenti Archius, a daughter of Mitra Karya auto repair shop owner Irwan Archius, said no buses were allowed to park at the site at night.

"My father was angry that night knowing that the bus driver had parked the bus in our yard without permission.

"He once checked the outside a few minutes before 10 p.m. but found nobody around," the 18-year-old girl said at the repair shop.

The area was very quiet last night due to a heavy rain, Fenti added.

Separately, South Jakarta Police detectives were kept busy on Thursday morning following the finding of two pineapple-shaped grenades in a dry drainage ditch on Jl. Cipete Dalam.

But a Cilandak Police officer disclosed that the gold-colored grenades, found near the French international school by street cleaner Kuswanto, were no longer active.

"The explosive agent of the grenades was missing," said one of the officers, who showed the grenades to reporters.

According to Suryandi, another street cleaner in the area, said Kiswanto, 35, who is also his brother, found the grenades wrapped in a cloth and kept in a plastic bag in the ditch.

The grenades, he said, had been hidden under some secondhand goods, including some big flower pots, wardrobes and window panes, covering the ditch.

"The grenades were put precisely under the window panes," he said.

According to local housewife Rusmini, employers of a police officer named Sr. Supt. Jismet, who lived in nearby Jeruk Purut area, used to put secondhand goods there and offer them for sale to passersby.

An officer at the South Jakarta Police station confirmed that Sr. Supt. Jismet was a retired police officer, but that he had died some time ago.(asa)