Twisted ideology of a teen bombmaker

PETALING JAYA: The teenage bombmaker nabbed by police for planning to attack the Better Beer Festival thought it was his duty to kill others to prevent the country from straying further "from its role as a true Islamic nation".
According to a report in The Malaysian Insight, the Form Six student wanted "to teach Malaysia a lesson and this drove him to learn how to make bombs".
Quoting unnamed sources, the portal said the 19-year-old bombmaker was not influenced by any terrorist organisation and was self-radicalised.
Initial investigations revealed he did not have contact with any Malaysian or foreign Islamic State militant, it added.
"He was motivated by incidents affecting Muslims, and decided that Malaysia had strayed from its role as a true Islamic nation," a source was quoted as saying.
The STPM candidate was said to be the mastermind of the terrorist ring. He was arrested with a 34-year old ex-army personnel and a building contractor, 25, in Kelantan in a sting on Oct 10 by the Special Branch's Counter-Terrorism Unit (CTU).
The teenager is the youngest of nine children from a middle-class family. His father is a muezzin at the local surau, while his mother is a housewife, the report said.
"He is smart. He knew what to look for (bombmaking tutorials)," said the source. "He is so smart that he was able to build an IED from scratch. He is meticulous. The way the device was built showed he knew the mechanics of the device well."
Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun said the three Malaysian suspects had built high-impact improvised explosive devices (IED) or homemade bombs which they had planned to blow up at the festival.
Fireworks, matchsticks and a book on bomb-making were also among the many items recovered at the student's house.
He said the IED had an impact radius of 30m and was lethal enough to kill and injure within the range.
Mohamad Fuzi said the bombs were made of PVC pipes filled with explosive powder and ball-bearings as projectiles.
He said police had botched the trio's plans of launching an attack at the Better Beer Festival 2017 and other targets such as places of worship of non-Muslims, entertainment centres and the city centre here and Selangor.