BINANGUN, Indonesia : One of Southeast Asia's most wanted fugitives Noordin Mohammad Top narrowly escaped capture by Indonesian police in a raid that saw two of his top aides killed, police said. The elusive Malaysian-born militant, accused of masterminding a series of deadly terror attacks including the 2002 Bali bombing, was not at the house he had been frequenting in Central Java's sleepy Binangun village, they said. "We carried out a raid on a group we have been looking for. There was a shootout. Two people died in the shootout," national police chief Sutanto told reporters in remarks broadcast on ElShinta radio. Dramatic footage broadcast on local ANTV showed dozens of black-clad elite police and snipers surrounding the blue-trimmed home shaded by banana palms and several small explosions detonating inside. A police-detonated blast blew out one of the wooden doors and police were seen dragging a shirtless man through a window and taking him out into the street. It was not clear whether he was one of two men detained in the raid.
Noordin was believed to have been a top recruiter for the Al-Qaeda linked Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) regional extremist network but analysts believe both he and his now-dead main accomplice Azahari Husin may have split off to form an even more radical group. He most recently evaded capture by police last November, days after Azahari was killed in a hail of gunfire by police at his East Java hideout in Batu. At the time, police swooped on a house where Noordin had reportedly stayed only a day earlier but found only documents and ammunition. The militant -- variously described by police as clean-shaven, bearded or moustachioed -- was also believed to have given police the slip by a matter of hours in the Central Java capital Semarang, just before Azahari was killed.
Police spokesman Bambang Kuncoko told reporters in Jakarta that an elite anti-terror unit and regular police surrounded the rented hideout, located about 400 kilometres (250 miles) south of the capital Jakarta, before dawn. About three hours later, at about 6:00 am (2300 GMT Friday), an exchange of fire broke out between police and those in the house, he said. "Police believed there were five people inside the house, but we later found only four. We had hoped that when the raid took place, Noordin M. Top would be there but it turned out he was not," Kuncoko said.
The two militants killed Saturday were identified by police as Abdul Hadi, alias Bambang, and Jabir, while the captured men were named as Solahuddin and Mustagfirin. The spokesman said Abdul Hadi was on the police's wanted list and had been a "right hand man" of both Noordin and Azahari. He said Hadi was "tasked with bomb-making and spreading terror." Sutanto, speaking to reporters at the site, said Hadi's work "was to recruit new candidates for suicide bombings."
Kuncoko said Jabir was also a top aide to the Malaysian pair and was involved in the 2004 bombing of the Australian embassy in Jakarta, which saw 11 bystanders killed. He was a cousin of JI member Fathur Rohman Al-Ghozi, who was killed in a battle with Filipino troops in October 2003. Solahuddin meanwhile was a close confidant of Azahari and, along with Jabir, had conducted several bomb attacks, including on the Atrium Senen mall in Jakarta in August 2001, the spokesman said. Nobody was killed in that attack. He said the fourth man had also been involved in several attacks.
The men had rented the house for the past month, he added. National deputy police spokesman Anton Bahrul Alam told AFP that the hunt for Noordin was continuing. Police later erected a wall of plywood around the house, obstructing views from the road. Residents told AFP that the bodies had not yet been taken out of the house.