AT least 54 people were injured when explosions ripped through a mosque during Friday prayers at a high school in Indonesia.
Cops in capital Jakarta said the victims suffered injuries ranging from bruises to cuts, with three of them in serious condition.
Witnesses said they heard two powerful explosions around midday local time, moments after the Friday sermon began inside the mosque.
They described chaos inside the mosque as worshippers scrambled for safety.
“Our hearts were beating fast, we couldn’t breathe,” said Luciana, a cook at the school canteen.
She recounted scenes of shattered windows and chaos as people rushed to escape the compound.
“I thought it was an electrical wiring problem, or the sound system exploded, but we didn’t know exactly what it was because we ran out just as a white smoke billowed from the mosque,” Luciana added.
Officials also confirmed the suspect is a 17-year-old student at the school, who is undergoing surgery.
Students told local media he’s said to be bullied quite often and was allegedly known as a “loner” who made violent drawings.
Police are investigating his background and possible motive behind the blasts.
Indonesia’s national police chief Listyo Sigit Prabowo said no deaths have been reported so far.
He added: “The motive is still being investigated. We found toy weapons and some writings, which we are examining to understand the motive”.
Images circulating in local media reportedly showed what appeared to be a submachine gun and a pistol.
The larger weapon bore inscriptions reading: “14 words. For Agartha.” and “Brenton Tarrant. Welcome to Hell.”
Tarrant was the gunman behind the 2019 Christchurch mosque attack in New Zealand.
But Deputy House Speaker Lodewijk Freidrich Paulus later told CNN Indonesia the items “turned out to be a toy gun, not a real gun.”
He then urged the public not to assume the blast was a “terrorist act.”
A bomb squad was deployed to secure the state-run high school and search for additional explosive devices.
Police also sealed off the iron-gated compound while forensic teams combed the mosque for evidence.
The blasts left debris scattered but caused no major structural damage.
Indonesia is home to the world’s largest Muslim population.
The country has faced attacks on churches and Western sites in the past, but explosions targeting mosques are extremely rare.
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