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source: abc news
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Gunfire and explosions have killed at least six people in Jakarta with Indonesian police and military flooding the streets amid fears gunmen were still on the run.
Witnesses said at least one gunman had attacked a Starbucks cafe in the city centre — near a cluster of embassies and the United Nations offices — before shots were fired at bystanders and a further seven explosions rocked the area.
Bodies were seen lying on the streets as security forces moved in, with regular reports of gunfire and warnings of snipers in the area.
Police said the blasts were caused by grenades, not bombs."For now the gunfire has stopped but they are still on the run, we are afraid there will be more gunshots," national police spokesman Anton Charliyan told AFP news agency.
Mr Charliyan said three policemen and three civilians had been killed.
He said police did not know who was responsible, but that "we have previously received a threat from Islamic State that Indonesia will be the spotlight".
The ABC's South-East Asia correspondent Samantha Hawley said armoured trucks, the head of intelligence and bomb squad officers have joined police at the scene of the blasts.
Police warned people to stay away, saying they did not know how many attackers there were and feared there could be more blasts.
Officers at the scene told AFP news agency reporters to "get back" because there "is a sniper" on the roof of a building.
"The Starbucks cafe windows are blown out. I see three dead people on the road," a Reuters photographer who was on the scene said.
"There has been a lull in the shooting but someone is on the roof of the building and police are aiming their guns at him."
A police post on a main thoroughfare was damaged after six blasts were heard.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo said the blasts were "acts of terror".
"Our nation and our people should not be afraid, we will not be defeated by these acts of terror, I hope the public stay calm," he told MetroTV.
"We all are grieving for the fallen victims of this incident, but we also condemn the act that has disturbed the security and peace and spread terror among our people."
Editor-in-chief of the Jakarta Post, Meidyatama Suryodiningrat, said the targeted area was quite popular.
"It's less than one-and-a-half kilometres to the palace, it's basically where the centre of government is," he said.
"Five hundred metres away is the central bank building, you have multiple government buildings, major major centre of government area."
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