Suicide hotel blasts kill nine in Indonesia

SUICIDE bombers posing as guests attacked American luxury hotels in Indonesia’s capital and set off a pair of bombs yesterday that killed at least nine people and wounded more than 50, authorities said.

The bombings, which came two minutes apart, ended a four-year lull in terror attacks in the world’s most populous Muslim nation. The blasts at the high-rise JW Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels, located side-by-side in an upscale business district in Jakarta, blew out windows and scattered debris and glass across the street, kicking up a thick plume of smoke.

The attackers evaded hotel security, smuggling explosives into the Marriott and assembling the bombs in a room on the 18th floor, where an undetonated device was found after the explosions. The bombers had stayed at the hotel for two days and set off the blasts in restaurants at both hotels.