Investigators hunting extremists who are believed to be plotting more attacks after bombing the Australian embassy in Jakarta said Monday they were closing in on owners of a truck used to deliver the bomb.
The national police chief in Australia, which has sent forensic teams to probe Thursday's blast, said detectives have identified the chassis number of the truck, a clue that should help track those behind the attack.
Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty also said latest estimates showed 10 people had died in the blast, including seven men and two women, all of whom had been identified as Indonesians.
More than 180 people were hurt. He said it was possible the 10th person was the suicide bomber, which meant there was only one attacker and not two or more as originally thought. Indonesian police said the toll remained at nine but one survivor remained in critical condition.
"But the difficulty with this sort of investigation is we need DNA samples from the body parts, to be graphic about it, so final confirmation of that 10th person may not come for some time yet," Keelty said.
Keelty said that as long as two top suspects - Malaysian explosives experts Azahari Husin and Noordin Mohammad Top - were at large, there was always the potential for more attacks both in Indonesia and inside Australia.
Detectives have identified the vehicle used in the attack as a white Daihatsu box pickup and have pinpointed its chassis number.
Keelty said similar information about a vehicle used in an October 2002 bombing of a nightclub strip in Bali proved vital in catching those who carried out the attack which killed 202 people, 88 of them Australian.
"In the last few days the chassis number of the vehicle used in the bombings has been discovered," Keelty said on Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio.
"People might recall that that was one of the early leads in the Bali bombing that led to the identification of those responsible, so we are hoping that that will be the case on this occasion," he said.
