“One of those arrested had received money transferred from ISIS”, Badrodin said, using an acronym for the Islamic State group.
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Alarm around the world over the danger stemming from Islamic State increased after the Paris attacks and the killing of 14 people in California in December.
The country’s police chief said the man had confessed to planning a suicide atttack in the country. Whether or not IS had a direct role in the attack, supporters of the group were quick to claim responsibility online, conveying a message that its global reach is growing. Four of the five attackers who died, either in gun-battles with the police or after they detonated suicide bombs, have also been identified; they include two who have previously served prison sentences in Indonesia for militant activities.
Nevertheless, it was the first time the radical group has targeted the country with the world’s largest Muslim population, and the brazenness of the attack suggested a new brand of militancy in a country more used to low-level strikes on police.
Police have said one of the two victims of Indonesia’s worst terror incident in seven years was a local.
The country had been on edge for weeks over the threat posed by Islamist militants, and counter-terrorism police had rounded up about 20 people with suspected links to Islamic State. On one level, the attack in Jakarta was an attempt to change that narrative.
Police quickly tied the IS group to Thursday’s attack, labeling Bahrun Naim as its instigator and funder, but they’ve given scant details beyond saying that an IS flag was found in one attacker’s home.
Widodo is moving to try to ensure calm and confidence in Indonesia after five armed gunmen set off a bomb inside a coffee shop on Thursday in central Jakarta, then engaged in a 2-hour shootout with police before either blowing themselves up or being shot dead.
A victim who was injured in last week’s extremist attack in Jakarta has died, raising the overall death toll to eight. He says that Naim has become an “inspiring figure” for ISIS-supporting youth in Indonesia. They also outlined a partial reconstruction of events based on security camera video, part of which showed a Starbucks customer escaping from the grip of a bomber before he detonated his suicide bomb.
Authorities have named Bahrum Naim, an Indonesian believed to be fighting with IS in Syria, as the suspected co-ordinator.
“These terrorist attacks can occur anywhere and anytime, that’s why we are continuing to ensure that our law enforcement security and intelligence have the resources and the support that they need to keep Australians safe”, Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said.
Three men with suspected links to the attackers were also arrested on Friday.
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After the coordinated attacks across Paris in November, the militant intellectual published a blog in which he explained to his followers how it was easy to move jihad from “guerrilla warfare” in Indonesia’s equatorial jungles to a city.
