Car Bomb Near Embassy in Indonesia Kills 7

JAKARTA, Indonesia – A powerful car bomb exploded outside the gates of the Australian Embassy in Jakarta on Thursday, killing seven people and wounding nearly 100 in an attack police blamed on al-Qaida-linked terrorists.

The blast flattened the embassy’s gate, mangled cars on the busy commercial street and shattered the windows of nearby high-rise buildings. Dazed survivors desperately tried to locate colleagues and relatives.

“I can’t find my family,” said Suharti, who had eight relatives working in the mission. “I am terrified. I don’t know where they are.”

A senior Indonesian police officer who asked not to be identified said seven people died in the 10:15 a.m. blast, including three policemen guarding the building. A doctor at a nearby hospital said 98 people were admitted with injuries, none of them foreigners.

No one inside the fortified embassy was hurt, said Lyndall Sachs, a spokeswoman for the Australian foreign ministry in Canberra.

“Initial investigations show this was a car bomb. We do not know whether anyone was in the car,” police chief Gen. Dai Bachtiar said.

The explosion shook buildings across a large part of the central commercial district of the city of 12 million people. A thick plume of white smoke rose up above the embassy.

Passers-by witnessed grisly scenes as security officers covered the bodies of victims ripped apart by the blast with newspapers. A severed human leg lay on the intersection between the two lanes of the street, its trousers torn of the by force of the explosion.

Police immediately blamed Jemaah Islamiyah, the Southeast Asian terror network that is linked to al-Qaida. The group has been accused in several deadly bombings, including the bombing of the JW Marriott hotel in the same neighborhood last year, in which 12 people were killed.

A 2002 terrorist attack on the resort island of Bali killed more 200 people, including 88 Australian tourists.

“The modus operandi is very similar to other attacks, including the Bali bombings and the Marriott blast,” Bachtiar said. “We can conclude (the perpetrators) are the same group.”

The bombing could have been timed with several upcoming events: the anniversary Saturday of the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States, Indonesian presidential elections on Sept. 20, and Australian elections a month from now. Australia’s role as a U.S. ally in the war in Iraq has been a key issue in the election campaign.

“This is not a nation that is going to be intimidated by acts of terrorism,” Australian Prime Minister John Howard said.

Embassy media officer Elizabeth O’Neill said the force of the bomb shocked staff.

“(It was an) enormous bomb, the enormity of the crater, the police truck outside has been blown to bits, it’s like the wind has been pushed out of you,” O’Neill told Australia’s Nine TV Network.

The embassy is located on Rasuna Said Street, a main thoroughfare in the Kuningan district with foreign embassies, businesses and shopping malls. Bloody corpses and severed human remains were strewn across the six-lane street.

“The ground shook so hard I fell down. A huge column of white smoke rose up,” said Joko Triyanto, a security guard, his arms bleeding from shrapnel wounds sustained in the explosion.

President Megawati Sukarnoputri was in neighboring Brunei Thursday attending a royal wedding, but cut short her stay to return to Jakarta, officials said.

“We strongly condemn this action. Together we fight the war against terrorism,” Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda told reporters at the scene.

The bombing came as authorities prepared to press charges against jailed cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, who has been accused by police of heading Jemaah Islamiyah and playing a role in the Marriott Hotel. Bashir has denied any involvement in terrorism.

Bahtiar, the police chief, said the bombing may have been the work of Azahari Husin, a British-trained Malaysian engineer who has eluded capture for nearly three years. Husin, one of Asia’s most-wanted men and a member of Jemaah Islamiyah, has been linked to numerous bombings in Indonesia, including the Bali blasts.

In recent weeks several Western embassies, including those of the United States and Australia, have warned their citizens about possible attacks by Muslim militants.

On Thursday, the U.S. mission renewed the warning, urging Americans to stay away from the Kuningan district in which the blast occurred.

Indonesian security forces have arrested about 150 people over the Marriott and Bali attacks. More than 50 defendants have been sentenced so far – including three who received the death sentence.