‘Balqa explosives match those used by Salt terror cell‘

AMMAN — Specialised security teams scanning the Wadi Al Azraq area after Thursday’s explosions have found locally-made explosives buried underground that match those used by the terrorist cell that implemented the Fuheis attack last August in Salt, the government said on Friday.

Minister of State for Media Affairs and Government Spokesperson Jumana Ghunaimat said that the specialised security personnel dealt with the situation and detonated the explosives on site, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

Three people were killed and eight others were injured on Thursday in two consecutive explosions that took place in a deserted area in Wadi Al Azraq of Balqa Governorate, 29km west of Amman.

Ghunaimat added that the scanning and surveying operations were still ongoing in the area.

Two security officers were among the victims, while the third was a citizen who was working in the area at the time of the first explosion.

The first explosion was reported at 11:55am, Ghunaimat said on Thursday, after which specialised security agencies responded immediately to the scene, where citizen Abdul Sattar Shurafa was found dead, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

The second explosion took place as security personnel were investigating the scene, claiming the lives of Public Security Department officer 1st Lt. Ahmad Jaloudi and Warrant Officer Musab Otoum from the General Intelligence Department, in addition to injuring eight other security personnel.

In August of last year, a raid on a terrorist cell in Salt, which came in connection with a terrorist attack on a joint Gendarmerie-police patrol stationed in Fuheis a few days earlier, resulted in four deaths among personnel of the joint security force that raided the area in Salt, while security agents arrested five terrorists and killed three others.  

The bodies of three suspected terrorists were picked up from the rubble of the building they were hiding in after they detonated a bomb when they were cornered by security forces.

On Friday, Otoum and Jaloudi were laid to rest in their hometowns of Jerash’s Souf and Balqa’s Mahes, respectively, Petra reported.