On residents’ suspicion, neighbor nabbed for terrorism allegations

When the police arrested Zulkifli Lubis on terrorism allegations, it fueled his neighbors' suspicions, who questioned his family's reportedly unusual closeness.

“We had long suspected the Lubis’ family because they rarely socialized with their surrounding neighbors. Therefore we felt we had to report this to the police,” Andi Mawardi, head of Kalibaru neighborhood unit, said on Monday as quoted by tempointeraktif.com.

The Lubis family came to stay in the neighborhood around six months ago. They rented a two-story house there. Beforehand, the family was reported to have resided in another part of the town.

Mawardi said the local police had monitored them from a distance regularly following the report. From the monitoring, the police suspected a connection between Lubis and a terrorist cell.

The police’s antiterror squad arrested Lubis on Saturday, confiscating a small firearm and 25 bullets and one desktop computer from the house.

The police have yet to confirm with which terrorist cell they suspect Lubis may be allied.