Suspected suicide bombing targets police in Indonesia’s Medan

A blast outside the police headquarters in the Indonesian city of Medan in North Sumatra was a suspected suicide bombing, a police spokesman said on Wednesday.

Tatan Dirsan Atmaja, a spokesman for the North Sumatra police, said some police officers had been wounded in the blast that occurred at 8:40am (0140 GMT) and that the suspected suicide bomber had died in the attack.

A number of Indonesian television channels showed footage of people rushing out of buildings around the headquarters.

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via @detikinet https://t.co/3LANtEUZMD

— detikcom (@detikcom) November 13, 2019

The motive for Wednesday’s attack was not immediately clear, but Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country, has suffered a resurgence in homegrown militancy in recent years, with some attacks aimed at the police.

National police spokesman Dedi Prasetyo said the blast happened in a car park near an area where people were queueing for clearance letters from police.

“We’re on alert right now,” Prasetyo told Kompas TV. “The explosion didn’t reach the centre for the clearance letter service, it was just in a parking lot.”

In recent years, Islamic fighters, including the outlawed Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD), a homegrown Indonesian armed group linked to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL or ISIS). have staged a series of attacks against the police.

The latest bombing comes a month after a suspected fighter stabbed and wounded Wiranto, who was Indonesia’s security minister at the time.