Jakarta assault over, no more attackers on the loose: police

[JAKARTA] An assault on Jakarta is over and no more perpetrators are at large, police said Thursday, after gunfire and explosions left five attackers and two civilians dead in the Indonesian capital.

"At the moment the situation is under control," Jakarta police spokesman Muhammad Iqbal said.

Asked whether some attackers were still on the loose, he replied: "We can assure you there are no more." Deputy National Police Chief Budi Gunawan confirmed the assault was over.

Security Minister Luhut Panjaitan had earlier said five attackers and two civilians, one of them a Dutch citizen, were killed.

While no one has yet claimed responsibility for the attacks, they raise the prospect that home-grown extremists bloodied on the battlefields of the Middle East with the Islamic State group could have brought their jihad home.

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim-majority country, suffered several major bomb attacks by Islamic radicals between 2000 and 2009, including a strike on the resort island of Bali in 2002 that killed 202 people.

A security crackdown has since weakened the most dangerous extremist networks, leading to a long lull in large-scale strikes.

AFP