JAKARTA: Alleged members of a militant group shot a police officer to death in eastern Indonesia in the latest assault targeting security officials in the world’s most populous Muslim country, police said.
Five gunmen ambushed and took hostage villagers and police officers who had just returned from Friday prayers at a small mosque near a police post in Central Sulawesi province’s Salubanga village, said National Police spokesperson Argo Yuwono.
He said the hostages managed to escape when the gunmen, believed to be members of the East Indonesia Mujahideen militant group, sneaked into the mosque’s yard and opened fire at the officers and villagers, killing a police officer, and fled to a nearby forested area in Parigi Moutong district. The attack occurred amid security operations that had been intensified in the past months in Poso, a neighbouring mountainous district considered an extremist hotbed, to try to capture the rest of the group’s members.Indonesia, which is home to some 230 million Muslims, has carried out a sustained crackdown on militants since bombings on the tourist island of Bali in 2002 killed 202 people, mostly foreigners.
The Jemaah Islamiyah military network, which was blamed for the Bali attacks, was neutralised following the arrests of hundreds of its militants and leaders. But new threats have emerged in recent times from Islamic State group-inspired radicals who have targeted security forces and local “infidels” instead of Westerners. — AP
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