11 Feb 2013

Counter-terrorism policy seen as encouraging revenge killings

6:00 pm on 11 February 2013

Detachment 88, a counter-terrorism squad in Indonesia, has been warned its policy of shooting terrorist suspects is encouraging more revenge attacks.

Since 2002, police from Detachment 88 and other officers have shot dead 90 terrorism suspects.

International Crisis Group terrorism expert Sidney Jones says its methods are prompting retaliatory attacks, the ABC reports.

Dr Jones says Detachment 88 must "be careful about the way that operations are conducted so as not to give fuel to the jihadi movement that is still alive, even if not well".

She says police became the No 1 enemy of terrorist splinter cells when Detachment 88 broke up a training camp in Aceh in 2010 - and there has since been a correlating increase in targeted police killings.

"The more deaths that you have at police hands is just going to increase that," Dr Jones says.

A national police spokesperson, Boy Rafli, told the ABC Dr Jones's opinion is not worth commenting on.