Bali police just miss bombing suspect

JAKARTA - One of the most wanted men in Asia and a prime suspect in the suicide bombings on Bali was on the Indonesian resort island shortly before last weekend's deadly blasts, a police official has said.

Police narrowly missed catching Malaysian Noordin M. Top, 35, during a pre-dawn raid on Friday in the central Java village of Purwantoro, according to Abdul Madjid, police chief in the city of Solo.

Police and an anti-terrorist force arrived at around 3am in Purwantoro, about a two-hour drive from Solo, but were too late to capture Top.

"He stayed there on (September) 26th and had been to Bali and returned back. Hopefully, we will sweep again tonight," Madjid said.

Noordin and fellow Malaysian Azahari bin Husin are the suspected masterminds behind Saturday's attacks on three packed restaurants in Bali that killed 22 -- including the three suicide bombers -- and wounded 146.

Indonesian authorities say the two were also behind the October, 2002, bombings of nightclubs in Bali's Kuta Beach that killed 202 people and suicide car-bombings at a Jakarta luxury hotel in 2003 and outside the Australian embassy in the Indonesian capital in 2004.

Top and Azahari have eluded capture for years by staying in safe houses in Indonesia, the world's fourth-most populous Muslim country.

Top and Azahari might have formed a violent faction with new personnel within Jemaah Islamiah (JI), an al Qaeda-linked group blamed for the car-bombs on Bali and in Jakarta, police and experts said.

"They (the bombers) come from a new group," Bali police chief Made Mangku Pastika said on Friday. "A new generation means that (they) are not known by the old group," he said, although he did not rule out links with JI.

Experts say numerous arrests in connection with the previous bombings has destroyed much of the old JI structure.

Police have questioned at least 115 people, but no one has been arrested or charged with Saturday's attacks.

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer is expected to push Jakarta to ban JI during a visit to Bali and Jakarta next week.

But Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda told reporters this had long been debated. "Banning something that formally does not exist prompts us to calculate the benefits and fallout."

Jemaah Islamiah translates as "Muslim Community" and Jakarta is seen to be reluctant to ban a group that might provoke a political backlash.

Police and hospital authorities say 14 Indonesians, four Australians and one Japanese died as a result of Saturday's blasts.

- REUTERS