Jakarta
08 August 2009
Indonesian police officers gather outside a house after exchanging gunfire in Temanggung, Central Java, Indonesia, 08 Aug 2009 |
Police say they are trying to identify a body found in the house in rural Central Java after a long gunbattle ended Saturday morning. Some reports say one of at least two bodies removed from the house is that of Noordin Mohammad Top.
Noordin, a Malaysian native, has been the most wanted man in Indonesia for the past six years. He has been linked to terror attacks in Indonesia and to the al-Qaida-linked regional group, Jemaah Islamiyah.
Noordin's group has been implicated in the July 17 attacks on the Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels in Jakarta, which killed nine people and wounded more than 50.
He narrowly escaped arrest several times in the past years, but terrorism expert Sidney Jones from the International Crisis Group, says this time the Indonesian police has finally managed to capture its long-standing nemesis.
"I think he has been killed, I got several confirmations from the police. It doesn't mean the end of terrorism in Indonesia because even if you got the whole gang that was involved in the Marriott bomb it still wouldn't mean that you had eliminated terrorism from Indonesia. But it's a huge step forward," said Jones.
Police officers remove the body of a terrorist suspect after a raid on a militant safe house in Temanggung, Central Java, Indonesia, 08 Aug 2009 |
Sidney Jones says the double raids confirm the high efficiency of the Indonesian anti-terrorism police.
"I think there was a lot of unnecessary disparaging in the weeks that followed the 17 of July bombings. But I think the police deserves praise for getting Noordin less than a month after the bombing took place," said Jones.
Last month's bombings were a shock for Indonesians who believed terrorism had been uprooted in the country because there had been no attacks for four years. But Jones says the swiftness of police actions shows that Indonesian anti-terror policies are on the right track.