5-year-old Jakarta blast victim wakes up crying

5-year-old Jakarta blast victim wakes up crying

Agencies
Singapore

After days under heavy sedation, a five-year-old girl critically
wounded in the Australian Embassy bombing in Indonesia finally
opened her eyes on Tuesday and communicated with her stepfather
and grandfather.

Elisabeth Manuela Bambina Musu's Italian stepfather, Manuel
Musu, was at her bedside when she awoke.

"She opened her eyes and she looked at me," Musu said. "I have
given her so many questions about her life and she answered yes,
yes, moving the head and she looked at me."

"The first time she opened her eyes she cried," Musu added.

Elisabeth had her respirator removed on Tuesday morning and
has been breathing well on her own and talking with her step-
grandfather, Enrico Musu, said Ng Puay Yong, a consultant
neurosurgeon at Mount Elizabeth hospital, where she is being
treated.

According to Ng, Elisabeth is still unaware that her mother,
27-year-old Maria Eva Komalawati, was killed in Thursday's blast.

Ng said doctors remain concerned about the possibility of the
girl developing an infection but that there was "no evidence of
serious infection yet."

Elisabeth was admitted on Friday to Mount Elizabeth, where she
had been kept under heavy sedation because of her injuries.

Several large pieces of shrapnel were removed from her abdomen
and brain and many smaller ones still remain in her body. Doctors
have said she will suffer some paralysis on her right side but
the extent of the disability won't be clear for another six
months.

When the blast occurred, Elisabeth was heading for the embassy
to pick up her new Australian passport after becoming a citizen
on Sept. 1.

Komalawati's Italian husband, Musu, and the girl's biological
father, Australian police officer David Norman, were both keeping
a constant vigil by her side.

Dual citizenship - Australian and Italian - is now an option
under consideration for a five-year-old Jakarta bomb blast
victim, a newspaper reported on Tuesday.

With both claiming custody of the child, The Straits Times
said dual citizenship is an option being sought.

Norman, 25, and Musa, 31, have been drawn into a custody
tussle since Komalawati, was killed in the explosion. Eight other
people died and 182 were injured.

Musu said he was grateful for the immediate assistance given
to Elisabeth by the Australian authorities and the High
Commission in Jakarta.

"I am glad that the Australian High Commission and the Italian
Embassy are cooperating to do their best to help my daughter," he
said.

Musu and Komalawati married in 1998 and lived in Italy.