Indonesian authorities on Friday said they have identified a 17-year-old boy as the suspect in an attack that shook a mosque at a high school in the capital, Jakarta, injuring at least 54 people, mostly students.
Witnesses told local television stations that they heard at least two loud blasts around midday, just as the sermon had started at Friday prayers, from inside and outside the mosque at SMA 72, a state high school within a navy compound in Jakarta’s northern Kelapa Gading neighborhood.
Students and others ran out in panic as gray smoke filled the mosque.
Photo: Reuters
Police said they had recovered a toy submachine gun belonging to the suspect and inscribed with what appeared to be white supremacist slogans. However, they brushed away speculation that the blasts were a terror attack.
“The suspect is a 17-year-old male student” who was undergoing surgery, Indonesian Deputy Speaker Sufmi Dasco Ahmad told reporters after visiting victims at a hospital.
He gave no more details.
Indonesian National Police Chief Listyo Sigit said the suspect was one of two students having surgery for injuries from the blasts.
“Our personnel are currently conducting an in-depth investigation to determine the suspect’s identity and the environment where he lives, including his house and others,” Sigit told a news conference at the presidential palace in Jakarta.
Sigit said investigators are still collecting information to determine a motive, including how the suspect was able to assemble a toy submachine gun with words inscribed on it including “14 words. For Agartha,” and “Brenton Tarrant: Welcome to hell.”
Brenton Tarrant is the perpetrator of a 2019 mass shooting at a mosque and Islamic center in Christchurch, New Zealand, that killed 51 and injured dozens of other, while “14 words” is generally a reference to a white supremacist slogan.
“We discovered the weapon was a toy gun with specific markings, which we are also investigating to understand the motive, including how he assembled it and carried out the attack,” Sigit said.
Most of the victims sustained burns and injuries from flying glass. The type of explosives used was not immediately known, but the blasts came from near the mosque’s loudspeaker, Jakarta police chief Asep Edi Suheri said.
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