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Jakarta Hotel Bomb Kills at Least 10, Injures More Than 100
Police Say Blast Was Likely Suicide Attack
By Ellen Nakashima
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, August 5, 2003; 7:40 PM
JAKARTA, Indonesia, Aug. 5 -- A powerful car bomb exploded in front of the JW Marriott Hotel here this afternoon, killing at least 10 people, and injuring more than 100, including two Americans, in what officials said appeared to be a suicide attack.
It was the worst act of terror in Indonesia since two bombs exploded on the resort island of Bali last year, killing 202 people.
Piles of broken glass, pieces of burned, twisted metal, bloody body parts and singed shoes and clothing littered the area surrounding the hotel and the adjacent commercial building, Mutiara Plaza. The hotel's windows were shattered up to the 21st floor. The explosion caused a fire at the neighboring office building, where virtually one whole side of the highrise had its windows shattered, with shredded drapes flapping in the wind. Shells of at least eight burned cars and limousines smoldered this afternoon in front of the building.
No one claimed responsibility for the bombing, but analysts said they see it as the work of the regional terror network, Jemaah Islamiah. It comes as Indonesian police have made significant strides against militant Islam, arresting more than 40 suspected Jemaah Islamiah members accused of involvement in last October's Bali bombing, the most devastating terror attack since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.
Indonesian Police Gen. Dai Bachtiar said the bomb was placed in a Toyota Kijang, an Indonesian minivan, which was in a taxi queue snaking its way forward toward the hotel's lobby. It exploded at about 12:45 p.m., he said.
Many of the victims were at the Marriott's popular ground-floor Sailendra Restaurant, which was packed with prospective diners. "I just heard an explosion and saw glass everywhere," said Irna Fahrianti, 19, lying in a bed at the Jakarta Hospital with a leg injury. "I covered my head with a tray. Everyone ran out, including me. I held my leg. My friend helped me."
Fahrianti, on her fourth day as a trainee waitress at the restaurant, ran to a car, whose driver took her to the hospital.
Two Americans were injured, and none were reported killed, U.S. Embassy officials said. One of the two injured was treated and released. The other is still being treated, U.S. Ambassador Ralph L. Boyce said. "We extend our deepest condolences to the victims of this deplorable act of violence," the ambassador added.
Though the Marriott is a Western target, owned by an Indonesian and managed by Americans, most of the dead and injured were Indonesians.
As with Bali last year, white boards were posted outside hospital emergency rooms with the names -- or sometimes just a nationality -- of the wounded: Astrid Wikastri; Agus; USA; Oscar, 24; Pieter, 37.
Simon Leunig, a marketing manager from Perth, Australia, had just showered in his seventh floor hotel room when he heard an explosion. "The windows blew in, throwing me across the room onto the bed," he recounted.
He grabbed his cell phone and passport, slapped on a pair of trousers and sneakers, and taking the elevator, "got out of there as fast as I could." He helped one wounded guest out from the lobby, and outside saw two dead Indonesian limousine or taxi drivers. He helped carry one badly injured man, a piece of whose burned clothing he was still clutching as he stood outside the shattered hotel. "I think he's going to make it," he said of the man he helped. Another man had lost his leg, he said.
About 100 yards from the hotel, on a sidewalk near the Mutiara Plaza, lay a pair of burned FILA sneakers and one black loafer, some torn and burned clothing and a bloody piece of human bone. Forensic workers carefully wrapped everything that could constitute evidence with gauze sheets and removed it for examination.
Also damaged was a building on the other side of the Marriott, which housed several foreign missions, including the Swedish and Danish embassies.
The explosion came on the same day that Abubakar Baasyir, the spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiah, was testifying in his own defense in a trial in which he is accused of treason and involvement in church bombings on Christmas Eve 2000 that killed 19 people. Police have also alleged he was involved in a plot to kill President Megawati Sukarnoputri.
It also came two days before the first verdict is expected in the Bali bombing trials and four days after Megawati vowed to destroy the terror networks responsible for the Bali blasts and other bombings in this, the world's most populous Muslim country. This "domestic branch of the international terrorism is a terrifying threat," she said.
"It's clearly Jemaah Islamiah," said Zachary Abuza, a Simmons College professor who has extensively studied militant Islam in Southeast Asia. "This shows these guys still have a lot of fight in them. . . . This is not something you retire from. They also do it to justify, for morale's sake, their own organization."
A Western analyst in Jakarta, who asked not to be quoted by name, said the bombing is "all part of a game to demonstrate that despite the series of arrests that have occurred, that Jemaah Islamiah is alive, living and well. It is purely a statement."
The 33-floor, 333-room Marriott, which opened in September 2001, is the latest luxury hotel in this city of 10 million. The U.S. Embassy has held town meetings there, billets its temporary duty personnel there and has held two National Day celebrations there.
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