bali bombers executed, page-21

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,24626276-401,00.html

"Bali bomber and smiling assassin Amrozi died a coward"

AMROZI, the smiling assassin, was not so brave when faced with his own death. His older brother Mukhlas was more defiant and praised God to the end.

And when the time came - about 11pm on Saturday, local Indonesian time - to be shackled hand and foot and led from their jail cells to the execution ground, the three Bali bombers accepted their fate without struggle.

Sources inside Batu prison and involved in the execution of Amrozi bin Nurhasyim, Mukhlas, aka Ali Ghufron, and Imam Samudra, aka Abdul Aziz, yesterday revealed to The Courier-Mail details of how the trio were put to death six years after their crimes.

One source said that of the three, Amrozi was the least brave and that as his end neared he looked "pale" and afraid.

He was also the quickest to die after all three were strapped to wooden posts and shot at the same time by firing squads.

His older brother Mukhlas was more defiant, repeatedly shouting "Allah Akbar" until his last moments. One source said that even as he was dying he praised God.

It was Amrozi who earned the contempt of Australians and the world when, after his arrest, he smiled for the cameras and took pride in the devastation caused.

When he was sentenced to death, he cheered and gave the thumbs up to judges, then to his victims' families.

The three men had known death was stalking them and, according to jail sources, seemed resigned to their fate.

At 11pm on Saturday, about 30 members of the paramilitary Brimob police, wearing balaclavas to hide their identity, went to the cells of the three men.

The three were shackled hand and feet, chains running from wrist to the ankle.

"They looked like they accepted their fate. They didn't struggle," one witness said.

As they were lead from their cells, their ankles were bound so tightly they had to shuffle.

The rest of the jail was quiet except for the bombers' exhortations of "Allah Akbar".

Other prisoners didn't join in. Several days earlier the bombers had said their goodbyes to prisoners and guards and asked for the traditional Muslim forgiveness.

"They were shouting but it was not really loud. The situation was quite calm. Not all three of them were shouting (Allah Akbar) at once. It was separately, one then the other," another source said.

The bombers had been praying all afternoon and when the officers came to collect them, Amrozi said he knew it was time. They had also been fasting.

They were taken out to waiting double-cab pick-up trucks. Each man was put in the second row of seats, in the middle and flanked by armed police on either side.

More police sat in the back of the truck.

The cars then drove off in procession to the execution zone of Nirbaya, about 3km south of the jail.

Amrozi was in the first car, followed by Imam Samudra in the second car and then Mukhlas.

It took longer than anticipated to reach the site because a torrential downpour earlier in the evening had made the narrow and windy track slippery and difficult to negotiate.

When they arrived at Nirbaya, the bombers were taken from the trucks and tied to posts. They were ministered to by three Muslim preachers who read to them from the Koran.

It is believed that Amrozi was tied to the middle post with Samudra to his left and Mukhlas to his right and that the men were standing up.

The Bali prosecutor, Ida Bagus Wiswantanu, proceeded to read out the execution order, detailing the men's crimes and their sentences.

Black hoods were put over their heads and at 12.15am the signal to shoot was given.

It was a dark night, the moon shrouded in cloud and there were no stars.

But the air was crisp and clean after the earlier monsoonal rain.

At 12.20am the doctor pronounced them dead and at 12.25am the three bodies were untied and taken to a nearby jail clinic for an autopsy.

Afterwards they were washed in the Muslim tradition by Ali Fauzi, the brother of Amrozi and Mukhlas, and the Muslim clerics.

At dawn the men's bodies were flown in police helicopters to their home villages in East and West Java for burial.