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Militant Stabs Indonesian Policemen Inside a Mosque | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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Indonesian police stand guard at the site of a militant attack in central Jakarta, Indonesia. Reuters file photo


Indonesian police shot dead a militant after he stabbed two police officers following prayers at a mosque near the national police headquarters in Jakarta.

The attacker had just finished praying with several policemen and other worshipers Friday night when he stabbed the two officers and screamed ‘infidel’, said national police spokesman Rikwanto, who like many Indonesians goes by one name.  

The perpetrator immediately ran to a nearby crowded bus terminal and refused to surrender. 

“He instead threatened to attack (us) with a bayonet. After warning shots were fired, he was killed on the spot,” Rikwanto said. 

The two police officers were stabbed in the neck and face and are being treated at a local hospital. 

The motive and identity of the attacker are still being examined, police spokesman Setyo Wasisto told AFP Saturday. 

Indonesia has seen a string of low level attacks since January last year carried out by ISIS sympathizers mostly targeting the police. A gun-and-bomb attack that killed four people in Jakarta marked the first ISIS strike in the region.

Saturday’s incident is just the second attack on the police this week. 

Last Sunday, two alleged ISIS militants attacked the police headquarters in Medan in North Sumatra province, leaving a policeman dead. In May three police officers were killed in twin suicide bombings at a Jakarta bus station.

Indonesian police displayed on Friday scores of notebooks inscribed with ISIS propaganda seized during a raid on the home of a suspected militant and said some appeared to have been used by children.

Police found hundreds of notebooks containing ISIS propaganda during the raid in connection with the stabbing death of the policeman in Medan.