Indonesian police and the military launched a series of anti-terror exercises yesterday, a week ahead of a visit to the country by US President Barack Obama.
The exercises were expected to be held in several places, including the capital’s main international airport, the stock market building, upmarket hotels and an area of sea north of Jakarta.
“We hope that these exercises can make both the military and police more professional in handling cases related to terrorism,” Indonesian military spokesman Sagom Tamboen said.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Tamboen said the timing of the exercises, about a week before Obama’s visit to the world’s most populous Muslim majority country, was a “coincidence.”
Obama, who was invited by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, lived in Jakarta as a boy between 1967 and 1971.
He is scheduled to leave the US on March 21 for the trip, which also includes stops in Guam and Australia.
Late last month, Indonesian police began a series of raids on militant suspects in remote Aceh Province. In the latest raids on Friday, two terror suspects were shot dead and eight arrested.
A senior leader of the Southeast Asian militant group Jemaah Islamiyah, Dulmatin, was gunned down by police on the outskirts of Jakarta on Tuesday.
Dulmatin, who was accused of masterminding the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, was buried on Friday morning.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS