The terrorists had planned to stab a police officer first and when a crowd gathers, they will carry out a suicide bombing, Jakarta police chief Inspector General M. Iriawan told reporters.
"We have seized evidence. Several bombs, including a pipe bomb, fire arms, backpacks with live bombs inside," he added.
Police spokesman Brigadier General Rikwanto said: "We have yet to find out the role of each of them, including who could have been the suicide bomber."
He said the men were linked to a terror cell in Solo, Central Java, whose plan to attack the presidential palace in Jakarta was foiled earlier this month.
The police conducted the raid at a rented house in a residential area called Puri Serpong 2 in South Tangerang, Banten province.
The terrorists were identified only as Omen, Helmi and Irwan. The man arrested was Adam.
Another police spokesman Awi Setiyono said two of the terrorists are members of Jamaah Ansharut Daulah, but he did not identify the two.
"The three killed terrorists resisted arrest during the raid by throwing a bomb and firing shots at police. The bomb didn't go off. Police also found a bigger bomb in the house," BG Rikwanto told Metro TV.
He also said the Detachment 88 anti-terror squad was stepping up raids ahead of year-end festivities. Like in previous years, the police had deployed additional officers at strategic locations, usually near churches.
The anti-terror unit had earlier arrested at least 14 members of the Solo cell, which police said was set up by Bahrun Naim, an Indonesian militant who is in the Middle East fighting alongside the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militant group.
Among the members of the group arrested so far are three women, including Dian Yulia Novi, who had worked as a maid in Singapore and Taiwan. Dian, 27, had hidden a homemade “rice-cooker” bomb in her rented room where she was arrested in Bekasi, West Java. – THE STRAITS TIMES/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
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