JAKARTA BOMBINGS-VISITORS TO INDONESIA SHOULD EXPECT MORE TO COME

JAKARTA BOMBINGS-VISITORS TO INDONESIA SHOULD EXPECT MORE TO COME

Hours before the attacks, fugitive al-Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri posted a message saying South-East Asia "is ripe for a jihadist revival" and urged attacks like the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.

Al Zawahiri primarily focused on an older 24-minute posting on al-Qaeda's propaganda arm As Sahab in the region, mentioning Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines.

That video opens with an old CNN interview with Bali bomber Amrozi Nurhasyim who said: "My message for Australians: don't come to places like that ever again... I'm sure that my colleagues will bomb it again." Amrozi was executed over the bombings.

Al Zawahiri's posting contained footage of other Bali bombers and radical Indonesian cleric Abu Bakar Bashir. The US has a $US25 million reward for the capture of Egyptian born Al Zawahiri.

The attacks come after another video was posted on the internet claiming that four extremist Islamic groups in the southern Philippines had merged, creating a new potent threat to the region. Leaders of the groups have pledged allegiance to Islamic State.