Terrifying details about the family bombing series in Indonesia
The family of six who carried out three church bombings in Indonesia on May 13 recently returned from Syria.
The above information was just posted by BBC, citing information from Indonesian police.
 |
| Scene of one of three bombings in Surabaya. Photo: EPA |
This is the deadliest series of attacks in Indonesia in more than a decade. A total of 13 people were killed and more than 40 were injured. The self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) has claimed responsibility.
A mother and two daughters blew themselves up at one church, while a father and two sons targeted two other churches in Surabaya, Indonesia's second-largest city, police said.
The family belonged to an IS-inspired group called Jemaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD), said Indonesian national police chief Tito Karnavian, adding they were among hundreds of Indonesians who had returned from Syria.
Police have made no mention of the bomber's family's involvement in the conflict in Syria.
Present at the scene of one of the three attacks, President Joko Widodo used the word "barbaric" to describe it, and said he had ordered the police to "investigate and destroy the perpetrators' network".
 |
| Indonesian President Joko Widodo (right) directly visited the scene of the bombings on May 13. Photo: Reuters |
Police identified the father as Dita Oepriarto, the local JAD branch leader. He drove his wife, Puji Kuswati, and their two daughters, aged 9 and 12, and dropped them off at Diponegoro Church, where the trio detonated their explosives.
Oepriarto himself drove the car bomb straight into the courtyard of the Pentecostal Church in central Surabaya.
His two sons, aged 16 and 18, rode a motorbike into Santa Maria Catholic Church and detonated bombs they were carrying.
3 attacks 5 minutes apart.
