Men seen in van wanted for firecracker blast
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)