JAKARTA: Indonesian police detained 48 students and a teacher from an Islamic boarding school and seized firearms and sharp weapons, a spokesman said yesterday, in the nation’s latest terror raid.
Dozens of police stormed the Darul Akhfiya school in eastern Java’s Nganjuk district on Monday and kept the students and teacher overnight for questioning.
“Police detained 48 students and a teacher on Monday after the community reported unusual activity at the school and expressed concern about possible anarchic behaviour,” national police spokesman Boy Rafli Amar told reporters.
Amar said the school was “strongly suspected of conducting terrorism training”.
“Police also seized long-barrelled rifles, ammunition and sharp weapons, including a cleaver, as well as books on jihad,” Amar said.
Indonesian police have conducted a series of terror raids in recent months, including a sweep across the island of Java in October, netting 11 suspects in a plan to attack the US embassy and other American targets.
Indonesia was rocked last decade by several deadly terror attacks blamed on the al-Qaeda-linked network
Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), including the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, mostly foreigners.
But a crackdown on
militancy in the country has crippled JI, and smaller terror cells that have carried out low-impact attacks have emerged. — AFP