SOUTH-East Asia's most wanted terrorist, Noordin M. Top, is dead and a plot for a massive car bomb attack in two weeks has been foiled after a 17-hour siege and raids on two homes by anti-terror squad police.
Simultaneous police operations in a village in Central Java and a suburb near Jakarta late on Friday night and early yesterday morning left several people dead, including Top, and uncovered a massive car bomb and other explosives of up to 500kg, which was to be used on "a very particular target" within the next two weeks.
Police have not yet revealed the target of the seized cache of explosives.
It is not yet known if Top was shot by police during a siege at his hideout, during which the police and terrorists exchanged fire or whether he killed himself by detonating a bomb or hand grenade.
Three other militants were arrested at Bekasi, on the outskirts of Jakarta where the car bomb and three other smaller bombs, identical to those used in the Marriott and Ritz-Carlton bombings, were found.
Two men shot dead by police as they clutched bombs were said to be "bridegrooms" or suicide bombers for the next attack and were also involved in the 2004 Australian Embassy bombing.
The operations by Indonesia's Detachment 88 anti-terror squad brought to an end Top's reign of terror and potentially saved many lives with the seizure of the car bomb and other bombs and foiling of the plans for yet another devastating attack.
Police have not yet revealed the plans for the car bomb, which could have been as devastating as the 2002 Bali nightclub bombs which claimed 200 innocent lives.
However local media speculated the target may have been Indonesia's President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, whose private residence is only 5km from the house where the bombs were found.
National Police Chief, General Bambang Hendarso Danuri, flew to Temanngung in Central Java, about two hours from Yogyakarta, and was waiting in the wings early yesterday as a police bomb robot went into the house after the door was blasted away by police explosives.
The operation began on Friday afternoon with the arrest of several people and late into the night police, who had encircled the house, exchanged gunfire with the occupants of the house in Temanngung. Finally, at 9.30am yesterday, police went into the house.
They came out clapping and shaking hands, prompting speculation that their elusive most wanted was finally theirs. At 11.40am an ambulance, believed to be carrying the body, left the house.
Top has been on the run for six years and was wanted for masterminding a string of bombings in Bali and Jakarta which left 47 dead since 2003.
His most recent work was the twin suicide bombings of the Marriott and Ritz-Carlton Hotels in Jakarta on July 17, which left seven people and two suicide bombers dead. Three Australians were among those killed. He was not involved in the first Bali bombing in 2002 but planned and orchestrated the 2003 Marriott Hotel and 2004 Australian Embassy bombings in Jakarta along with the 2005 triple suicide bombings of three Bali restaurants.
A website blog purporting to be from Top was posted after the most recent attacks, claiming responsibility. Significantly in that blog Top called himself "al-Qa'ida Indonesia" whilst previously he has called his group "al-Qa'ida for the Malay archipelago".
Top, an accountant known as the "moneyman", was a strategist and recruiter of suicide bombers. He managed to evade police dragnets by refusing to use mobile phones and using only couriers to run messages for him.
