Indonesian police say DNA tests show that a militant killed in a police
raid at the weekend was not Malaysian terror suspect Noordin Mohammed
Top.
Indonesian national police official Eddy Saparwoko said
Wednesday that the suspect shot dead during a siege in Central Java has
been identified as a man named Ibrohim.
He says they compared the DNA with his family and the match was 100 percent.
DNA
evidence also showed that the body is not, as was suspected, that of
Noordin Mohammed Top, Indonesia's most wanted terror suspect. Noordin
has ties with the regional terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah and is
suspected of planning the recent hotel bombings in Jakarta as well as
other terrorist attacks in the past decade.
Police say Ibrohim
was involved in the execution of the suicide bombings last month at the
JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels. They say Ibrohim had been working
as a florist at both hotels since 2005 and was able to bypass security
to bring into the hotels the explosives used in the attacks. Police say
he also recruited the two suicide bombers.
While Top is still
at large, Indonesian Police chief Bambang Hendarso Danuri says the
force will continue to pursue him and others involved in the bombings.
He says they will not stop and will continue their efforts to arrest them.
Authorities say the police raid uncovered explosives and foiled a plan to kill Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
Last
month's hotel bombings killed seven people and injured more than 50.
Noordin also is suspected of being involved in bombings on the resort
island of Bali that killed more than 200 people.
Jemaah
Islamiyah, which has links to the al-Qaida network, allegedly seeks to
create a single Islamic state across much of Southeast Asia. Scores of
its members have been convicted of terrorism and other crimes in
Indonesia and jailed.
