Police make first arrest following Bali bombings

Eva C. Komandjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

After 10 days of investigation, police acknowledged on Tuesday having arrested a man in connection with the recent terror attack on Bali.

But, again, most-wanted bomb-maker Noordin Moh. Top slipped through the police's fingers in a raid in Surakarta, Central Java.

The antiterror squad apprehended HS alias Hasan in the East Java town of Jember on Sunday. Hasan is a construction worker who rented a small apartment with three suspected suicide bombers on Jl. Nangka in Denpasar prior to the attacks on two cafes and a restaurant.

National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. Soenarko DA said Hasan would lead the police to the masterminds or the group behind the Bali bombings.

"We hope that we can uncover their network and thus can arrest them all," Soenarko said as quoted by Antara.

Soenarko said witnesses had told the police that Hasan, who is also an activist of a pesantren (Islamic boarding school) in East Java, shared the apartment with the three suspected suicide bombers around two weeks before the blasts in Kuta and Jimbaran. The witnesses said they never saw Hasan after the bombings.

A second police spokesman, Sr. Comr. Bambang Kuncoro, said another witness who happened to be in Raja's Bar and Restaurant when the bomb went off said he had seen one of the suspects before because he rented an apartment next door.

"One of the witnesses said he recognized one of the severed heads found in Kafe Nyoman as his neighbor's," Bambang said.

The witness identified the suspected suicide bomber by his initials as YT and told the police YT's hometown. Bambang refused to reveal the details of the disclosure.

Ten witnesses from Kafe Menega acknowledged having seen three strangers in front of Kafe Ubung, which is not far from the blast site, at around 3 p.m. on Oct. 1.

The strangers were all wearing black clothes and looked restless, with one of them walking about in front of the cafe.

Bambang said so far police had questioned a total of 230 witnesses in connection with the attack on Kafe Menega and Kafe Nyoman in Jimbaran and Raja's restaurant in Kuta.

Police have also confiscated from Hasan's apartment a computer, audio visual equipment and documents on the bombing plan as evidence.

In Mataram, on Bali's neighboring island of Lombok, police questioned an Acehnese man identified as Indrayoni as his ID card was found at the blast site in Kuta. Police are looking for his friend Ahmad Yadi for the same reason.

Indrayoni said he and Ahmad Yadi went to Bali last month to find jobs. They rented rooms near Raja's restaurant but went home a week after the explosion.

Mataram Police chief of detectives Adj. Comr. Eko Hadi Prayitno refused to comment on the questioning.

Separately, head of the Surakarta Police in Central Java Sr. Comr. Abdul Madjid said the police were beefing up security as, in previous cases, terrorists had "laid low" in the city.

The local police have made several arrests of suspected members of Jamaah Islamiyah, a regional terror group linked to al-Qaeda, in the neighboring towns of Klaten and Wonogiri.

After receiving a tip-off that Noordin M. Top was hiding in the area, the police raided a house in Surakarta on Sunday, only to find the Malaysian national had fled.

A police source said antiterror squad officers had hunted down the other Malaysian fugitive, Azahari bin Husin, who was believed to be hiding in an Islamic boarding school in Surakarta. However, Azahari fled several days before the police's arrival.

With additional reporting from Blontank Poer in Surakarta, Central Java, and Luh Putu Trisna Wahyuni in Mataram, West Nusa Tenggara.