NOORDIN M TOP LINKED TO HOTEL BOMBINGS IN JAKARTA

Jakarta, July 18 (ANTARA) - Fugitive Malaysian-born extremist Noordin M Top was linked to Friday's bombings on the JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels in Jakarta, an senior anti-terror official said.

"From the modus operandi used in Friday's bombings, it is clear they are linked to Noordin M Top," Ansyaad Mbai, head of the anti-terror desk at the political , legal and security affairs coordinating ministry, said here Saturday.

Although the modus operandi was conventional, it was carried out in a more sophisticated way, namely by infiltrating into the target area, he said.

"Previously, suicide bombings were conducted outside, in a hotel's front yard, for instance. But this time, the perpetrators dodged a tight security system and came very close to their target," Mbai said.

Although over the past four years there no terrorist actions occurred in Indonesia, Noordin M Top and his network cells continued to consolidate themselves actively despite the security agencies' successes in tracing and arresting Noordin M Top's men, he said.

"Friday's incident proves that they are still strong. Arresting Noordin M Top, the actor, should now be the priority. As long as the actor is still at large, all anticipative measures will be useless," he said.

Over the past few weeks, security agencies had traced and detained a number of people in areas believed to be the hideouts of Noordin M Top and his men, such as Cilacap (Central Java), Lampung and Malang (East Java).

One of the terrorist suspects captured recently was Syaefudin Zuhri who was arrested in Cilacap in June 2009.

The Marriott Hotel bombing on August 5, 2003 killed 12 people, including a Dutch national, and injured 147 others.

The Marriot bombing was believed to have been masterminded by Azhari Husin and Noordin M Top, both Malaysian nationals.

Azhari was killed in a police raid in East Java in November 2005 but Noording M Top is still at large.

Azhari and his associate Noordin Mohammad Top, a terror coordinator of the Al-Qaeda-linked Southeast Asian branch of the Jemaah Islamiyah militant network, are believed to have masterminded a series of major terrorist acts in Indonesia, including the Bali bombings in 2002, the JW Marriot hotel explosions in Jakarta in 2003, a deadly blast at the Australian Embassy in Jakarta in 2004, and bombings in Bali in October 2005 that killed more than 220 people.