Terror attack warning: Will be indiscriminate and target government

Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Terror bomb attacks may well continue, albeit with government facilities as the new targets, as opposed to public places, an official and an expert warned on Monday.

The terror attacks could also strike in unexpected places, they said.

Insp. Gen. Ansjaad Mbai, chairman of the antiterror body at the Office of the Coordinating Minister for Political and Security Affairs, and expert Hermawan Sulistyo of the National Institute of Sciences (LIPI), said that the country's security authorities would likely fail to prevent possible terror attacks because "they simply do not have the ability to do so."

Ansjaad and Hermawan were commenting on Monday's bomb blast at the House of Representatives compound in Central Jakarta.

"Even though we have been on the alert for possible bomb threats in Jakarta and other cities, we cannot predict when and where such terror attacks will occur.

"One thing for sure is that terror acts remain a threat in this country and will continue to pose a problem, even if we (security officers) manage to arrest many of the alleged perpetrators. They (the perpetrators) seem to come up with new motives to commit such acts all the time," Ansjaad said.

According to Ansjaad, the House, as well as other state-owned assets, was under tight security, but since the perpetrators keep changing their tactics, "they may still be able to attack those places."

"Some of us believe that the more security officers we deploy, the safer those places are ... but learning from the recent case, no one knows when an attack will strike next," Ansjaad said.

Hermawan meanwhile expressed skepticism that the terror threats would end, saying that the situation would be tougher for the government's official security guard contingent because "future bomb attacks will be indiscriminate and unpredictable."

Hermawan further said that the police had yet to improve their ability to deter terror attacks.

"The police, as well as other security forces, have been on the alert over possible bomb threats following the arrest of Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) members last week in Semarang (Central Java). And since their (JI members) scope of operation has become limited, they will launch indiscriminate attacks," Hermawan told The Jakarta Post.

Both Ansjaad and Hermawan speculated that JI -- a network which has been put on the UN's international terrorist list -- was likely behind the explosion inside the House compound. However, Hermawan stressed that "the clandestine group will not conduct such terror acts on its own because there is a high possibility that it has been infiltrated by various interest groups, including those with a political agenda."

Hermawan pointed out that Monday's blast was not related to the ongoing political activities at the House, including the investigation over the purchase of Russian-made Sukhoi aircraft.

Both Ansjaad and Hermawan dismissed the possible involvement of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) in the blast, considering that the secessionist group "usually deploys low explosive bombs instead of high explosive ones that went off at the House compound."

"Looking at JI's patterns, I believe that they were involved in the explosion at the House compound because it is the only organization in this country that has the necessary infrastructure to do so," Ansjaad said.