Thread: Bali bombing was God's will: Abu Bakar Bashir

Bali bombing was God's will: Abu Bakar Bashir
Stephen Fitzpatrick and Patrick Walters
16jun06

TERRORIST leader Abu Bakar Bashir taunted Australia yesterday, saying the Bali bombing victims had to die "because it was God's will".

As John Howard sent a terse letter to Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono over this week's release of the radical cleric, Bashir insisted the terrorists behind the Bali bombings "were not the killers, but only Allah's conduit" for the deaths.
Bashir was released on Wednesday after serving 26 months of a 30-month sentence for condoning the first Bali attack, in October 2002, which killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.
The Prime Minister's four-paragraph letter told Dr Yudhoyono of the "very deep personal concerns and the distress" felt by Australians at the release of Jemaah Islamiah's spiritual leader.
It comes just 10 days before the leaders are to meet on the Indonesian island of Batam, their first meeting since diplomatic tensions emerged over Australia's decision to grant visas to 42 Papuan asylum-seekers.
But Bashir, speaking at an Islamic school in the central Java city of Solo, where at least two of the Bali bombers studied, warned Mr Howard to "stay out of Indonesia's affairs".
"I urge the families of the victims, those who are not Muslims, to immediately convert to Islam so they can be saved and comforted by Allah," he said.
Families of Bali bombing victims last night called on Mr Howard to do more to protest to Indonesia about Bashir's release.
Peter Iliffe, whose 28-year-old son Joshua was killed in the 2002 bombings, said Australia had to stand up for itself.
"I think we've got to take a much stronger stance. We seem to cower at whatever the Indonesians do, we seem terrified of offending them," Mr Iliffe said.
Don Howard, whose son Adam was also killed in Bali, said Bashir should never have been released and the Prime Minister should try to do something to silence him.
"Why should we have to put up with the rantings of an idiot," hesaid. '
'Now once he's out, he wants to inflame the whole thing."
In his letter, the Prime Minister said Bashir's inflammatory statements on release "were affronting to the families of victims and all Australians". "While fully recognising and respecting the adherence to due process in the Indonesian courts in regard to (Bashir's) release, you would nonetheless appreciate the strength of the Australian people's reactions, particularly in view of his links to the 2002 Bali bombings," he wrote.
Mr Howard also reminded Dr Yudhoyono that Indonesia had an obligation under UN Security Council resolution 1267 to restrict Bashir's movements and prevent him becoming a security risk.
Mr Howard told parliament most Australians were appalled that Bashir was now a free man, saying the national feeling was one of "hostility and disgust".
He pledged that Australia was committed to working closely with Indonesia to combat terrorism, stressing that combined counter-terrorism efforts should be a focus of the leaders' next meeting.
Australia's acting ambassador in Jakarta conveyed to Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda Australia's concerns over Bashir's release.
However, Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd said Mr Howard should ask Jakarta to put Bashir under 24-surveillance and to shut down the cleric's schools if they expressed "anti-Australian, anti-Western hatred".
"The Australian Government spends a lot of time telling us that we should listen to Indonesian sensitivities - it is time that the Australian Government told Indonesia that they need to listen to Australian sensitivities," he said.
Last night, the World Food Program announced it would no longer use Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia, an organisation linked to Bashir, to distribute food to survivors of last month's earthquake in Central Java, which killed 6000 people. The move came after a protest from Foreign Minister Alexander Downer.
Bashir has looked spritely and full of energy after his release and revealed he kept his health up by walking half an hour a day around the exercise yard at Jakarta's Cipinang jail.
"For those who are still not Muslim, they must know that (the Bali bomb deaths) were God's will," Bashir said. "That's the advice that must be given."
Turning on Mr Howard and George W. Bush, Bashir said the two world leaders had to also convert to Islam if they were to be saved - a demand he previously put to an adoring crowd of hundreds of supporters on his return from Jakarta on Wednesday night.
"My message for John Howard is that he should become a Muslim if he wants to be saved and avoid hell," Bashir said to cheers shortly after his arrival. "He also should not try to make war on Islam, because he will certainly lose."
Bashir said he might visit the Bali bombers in their death-row cells in Central Java and said of Asia's most-wanted terrorist, Noordin Mohammed Top, that he was simply a "good Muslim" who had made a "mistake".
Top is wanted for playing a key role in most of Indonesia's terror attacks of recent years, including the 2002 Bali attack.
"His mistake was to use weapons in a peaceful area - weapons should only be used in a field of conflict," Bashir said.
"But (Top and others like him) are still good Muslim fighters, because their efforts and intentions are to defend Islam and the Muslim faithful, who are opposed by America everywhere."
Additional reporting: Cath Hart, Simon Kearney



privacy terms © The Australian