Several explosions hit a mosque at a high school during Friday prayers in Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, injuring at least 54 people, most of them students, police said. Witnesses told local television stations that they heard at least two loud bangs around noon local time, just as the sermon had begun at the mosque at SMA 27, a state high school inside a navy compound in the Kelapa Gading neighborhood, north of Jakarta.
Students and others ran out in panic as gray smoke filled the mosque. Most of the victims suffered minor to serious injuries from flying glass. The cause of the explosions was not immediately known, but they came from near the mosque’s loudspeaker, according to Jakarta police chief Asep Edi Suheri.
People were rushed to nearby hospitals. Some were soon sent home, but 20 students remain in hospital care, three of them with serious injuries, the police chief said.
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Suheri said a bomb disposal team that was sent to the scene found toy rifles and a toy gun near the mosque. “Police are still investigating the scene to determine the cause of the explosions,” Suheri said, and urged avoiding speculation that the incident was an attack before the police investigation is completed. “Let the authorities work first,” Suheri said. “We will communicate any results to the public.” (With information from the Associated Press)
