Suicide bomber of Australian embassy named
Abdul Khalik, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
The National Police officially named on Friday the suspected suicide bomber who perpetrated the Sept. 9 bombing outside the Australian Embassy, which killed 10 people and injured over 180 others.
DNA tests comparing samples found at the blast site with tissue and blood from suspects' families confirmed the bomber's identity as Heri Golun alias Heri Kurniawan, National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar said.
"We suspect he is the suicide bomber who drove the bomb van and died in the blast," he told a press conference.
Da'i said two samples of blood from the families of suspected bombers from Central and East Java were being matched with body fragments from the blast site to determine if there were any other bombers in the van.
The police also released a picture of Heri, 30, that was taken in December 2003.
Heri alias Igun or Agun was a resident of Kampung Ranji in Cigarung Village, Kebon Pedes district, Sukabumi regency, West Java. His parents have reportedly been identified as Didin Raydin and Anah Hasanah, also residents of Cigarung village.
On Thursday, Heri's wife, Sitem, reportedly delivered a baby in Cibuhaya village, Rengas Dengklok, West Java. The baby boy was named Ahmad Jundullah. Heri had sought the consent of his wife while she was pregnant to die as a martyr, according to the police.
National Police chief of detectives Comr. Gen. Suyitno Landung Sudjono confirmed that Heri was the suicide bomber as the DNA from nine separate body fragments found inside the van matched the DNA of his parents.
Da'i also said the police had found the house from which the van carrying the bomb left 12 hours before the actual bombing. "We are still investigating whether the house was used to assemble the bomb or whether it was just used for transit purposes," he added.
The police chief said a number of detained bomb suspects admitted that they were activists of the outlawed Indonesian Islamic State (NII) movement.
"We are investigating to see whether there are links between the bombing and this movement, although we have discovered no documents affirming a relationship between them," Da'i added.
Several media reports have said that Heri and another suspect, Rois alias Iwan Darmawan, who remains at large, were NII members. Rois is believed to be one of suspected terror mastermind Azahari bin Husin's closest aides.
Some NII leaders were reportedly co-founders of the regional Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) terror network, which has been blamed for a series of bombings in Indonesia.
The police said that Rois and Heri were members of a West Java suicide bomb squad and were recruited by JI's Azahari and Noordin Moh. Top between February and June of this year.
Azahari and Noordin, the two Malaysian fugitives, allegedly masterminded the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, and last year's JW Marriott Hotel attack, which claimed 12 lives.
Police said that the suspected suicide bomber or bombers who perpetrated the latest bombing in front of the Australian Embassy, Jakarta, had been among the new recruits.
The police arrested over 30 people before and after the embassy explosion, but have only named six of them as suspects.
All of the detained suspects are accused of harboring Azahari and Noordin and helping transport explosives for the Sept. 9 bombing.