Suspected suicide bomber hits Indonesian police

An apparent suicide bomber attacked this morning (November 13) a police station in the Indonesian city of Medan, killing the perpetrator and wounding officers, according to news agency reports.

Police did not immediately confirm a motive for the attack, though the assault comes just weeks after an Islamic State-aligned militant stabbed and severely wounded former security minister Wiranto, who like many Indonesians uses only one name.

Local television stations broadcast images of people rushing out of buildings around the police headquarters, situated in the northern region of Sumatra.

National police spokesman Dedi Prasetyo said the blast happened in a car park near an area where people were queuing for clearance letters from police.

The Jakarta Post newspaper reported at least one person was injured in the parking lot.

“We’re on alert right now,” Prasetyo told Kompas TV. “The explosion didn’t reach the center for the clearance letter service, it was just in a parking lot.”

Dedi said personnel from the National Police’s Densus 88 counterterrorism squad and the North Sumatra Police’s Indonesia Automatic Fingerprint Identification System had arrived at the scene to assist in the investigation.

A police source who requested anonymity told AFP that the attack was perpetrated by at least two suicide bombers. The information has not yet been officially confirmed.

Indonesian national news agency Antara reported the suspected suicide bomber had entered the police compound wearing a jacket from ride hailing service Gojek.

Islamic radicals, some tied to the Islamic State-inspired militant group Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD), have targeted police in a series of attacks in recent years.

Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country, has suffered a resurgence in homegrown militancy in recent years, with some attacks targeting police.

The militant resurgence comes after anti-terrorism units had largely incapacitated the al Qaeda-aligned Jemaah Islamiyah terror group responsible for various terror attacks hitting Western targets.

In August, Indonesian authorities shot and arrested a suspected militant who attacked police officers at a station in the country’s second-biggest city Surabaya.

– This breaking dispatch draws on news agency reports