Indonesian ISIS-linked bomber killed by police

BANDUNG: Indonesian police have shot dead a man linked to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group during a firefight at a government office yesterday after a small bomb was set off nearby.

No one else was hurt in the incident in the city of Bandung on Java island, which started with a pressure cooker bomb exploding in a park before the gun battle erupted in the office opposite.

The police said the attacker was a former terror convict from an ISIS-supporting network called Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD), which has been blamed for a series of recent attacks in the country, including an assault in Jakarta last year.

After the blast at about 9.30am (Singapore time), the attacker fled into a building belonging to local authorities opposite the park and set it ablaze.

The police exchanged fire during an hour-long standoff with the man.

He was shot in the stomach and died later in hospital.

Everyone was evacuated from the building unhurt.

The police seized guns and two backpacks carried by the attacker but did not say what they contained.

Indonesia police chief Tito Karnavian said the attacker had demanded that the authorities release his JAD associates from prison.

Indonesian security forces had arrested hundreds of militants during a sustained crackdown in recent years.

"He belongs to the group JAD - it is a main supporter of ISIS," Mr Karnavian told reporters.

"He asked for his friends to be released from prison."

He said the attacker, whom he did not name, had been jailed before over his involvement with militant training in Jantho in Aceh province.

Jantho was the location of a notorious Islamic extremist training camp, which was closed down by authorities in 2010.

Last month, the United States designated JAD a terrorist organisation, saying the network was an umbrella group for about two dozen Indonesian extremist outfits. - AFP