TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Police investigate ‘IS’ bomb threat at Pattimura University in Ambon
Police are investigating a bomb threat at Pattimura University’s School of Economics in Ambon amid rising fears of radicalism in academia.
Change Size
Policemen carry evidence from the site following a suicide bomb attack at a church in Surabaya on May 13, 2018. (AFP/Juni Kriswanto)
T
he Maluku Police are investigating a bomb threat at Pattimura University’s School of Economics in Ambon amid rising fears of radicalism in academia.
“We started the investigation on Wednesday, following up on reports of a handwritten note conveying a bomb threat in a waiting room at the School of Economics,” said Maluku Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. M. Roem Ohoirat on Thursday as quoted by Antara news agency.
The note plastered on a wall in the waiting room suggested a connection with the terror group Islamic State (IS), or ISIS.
It read: “We terrorists are threatening to bomb Pattimura University and everything in it, ISIS.”
Investigators from Maluku Police’s special crimes unit had secured the location and questioned several eyewitnesses, including Rasul Lakadimu, the janitor who was the first to notice the note containing the threat, Roem said.
Rasul reportedly told police that he had discovered the handwritten note when he was about to clean the dean’s office at 7:15 a.m. on Wednesday and immediately reported the bomb threat to campus security.
Prior to the finding, the department had held a student council election on Tuesday, Pattimura School of Economics dean Earli Leiwakabessy had told the police.
Although the election was filled with debates between candidates, it had ended amicably without any burst of violence among students, according to Earli’s testimony. (rfa/afr)
