2019 Medan Suicide Bombing

On 13 November 2019, at around 8:40 AM, a suicide bombing occurred at the grounds of the Medan Metropolitan Police (Polrestabes) headquarters in North Sumatra, Indonesia. The explosion took place shortly after a routine morning roll call by police officers and occurred outside the headquarters building, within the compound grounds. According to reports, the attacker had blended into a group of people queueing to obtain certificates of good conduct before detonating the explosive device in the parking lot. Other eyewitness accounts described the attacker as wearing a jacket and a backpack, and stated he had attempted to rush through a police security checkpoint at the building's entrance.

The attacker was killed in the blast, and the explosion injured four police officers and two civilians. Police initially treated the perpetrator as a lone actor. In the aftermath, investigators recovered the attacker's body parts, nails, and fragments of the explosive device at the scene.

Despite the destruction of his body, police identified the attacker through fingerprint analysis as Rabbial Muslim Nasution, a 24-year-old resident of Medan who had recently worked as an online motorcycle taxi driver. Investigators explored his ties to Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD), an Islamic State-affiliated militant network, and questioned several of his family members. Nasution was buried in the city despite objections from some residents. His parents-in-law told police he had shown a marked change in behavior in the six months before the attack, which officials linked to indoctrination by a cleric who was being sought by national police at the time. Police later reported that Nasution's wife had been planning a separate terror attack in Bali and was subsequently arrested. Following further investigation, the Indonesian National Police (Polri) formally stated that JAD was behind the Medan attack.

In the days after the bombing, Polri launched raids across the country. Approximately one week later, authorities reported that 74 terror suspects had been apprehended nationwide, with more than half arrested outside North Sumatra. Indonesia's elite counter-terrorism unit, Densus 88, shot and killed two alleged bomb assemblers during an ambush in Deli Serdang Regency. Some suspects were reported to have attended training camps in Karo Regency, where police confiscated weapons including improvised firearms, airsoft guns, traditional blades, and bows.

President Joko Widodo ordered an investigation to identify and apprehend those responsible for the attack. Deputy Speaker of the People's Consultative Assembly Zulkifli Hasan remarked that Polri had been caught off guard by the bombing, drawing a comparison to an earlier attack on security minister Wiranto.