Australian survivors recall the Bali bombing
Wahyoe Boediwardhana, The Jakarta Post, Denpasar, Bali
In a touching testimony here on Monday, three Australians gave the judges in the trial of main Bali bombing suspect Amrozi a glimpse at the torment the blasts inflicted on people of neighboring Australia.
Out of the 202 innocent lives taken in the brutal terrorist attack, 88 were Australian. It sent a chill through the nation, whose people had for decades considered Bali their second home.
Stuart James Anstee, Jason McCartney and Peter Hughes told of the terrible ordeal and suffering they endured during and after the bombings. They were the first foreigners to testify in the trial of Bali bombing suspects.
"It was like a very large fireworks display. A hissing orange glow flew into the air and knocked me to the ground. I was briefly blinded by the flash. When my vision came back, I could not see because smoke engulfed everything. I grabbed somebody next to me and struggled to find a way out," McCartney vividly recalled.
Half of his body was burned and there were extensive shrapnel wounds on various parts of his body. His lungs collapsed, sending him into a comma for a week during medical treatment in Australia.
Hughes and McCartney were in Paddy's Pub when the first bomb ripped through the nightclub, while Anstee was in the Sari Club when the biggest of three bombs exploded. They were all severely injured and are still undergoing intensive physiotherapy.
Anstee, 24, from Tasmania, said he blacked out for several minutes after a huge car bomb ripped through the Sari Club where he was partying with five friends. Three of them died.
"When I woke up, I noticed blood spurting from my neck and my leg and my left arm. I saw many dead bodies inside and outside the Sari Club," a composed Anstee, an environmental scientist, told the court with his hands clasped tightly in his lap.
"Australians are angry at the people who committed this crime, angry at the terrorists," he said, staring at Amrozi, who looked back but said nothing, Reuters reported.
The three all agreed that the pain went beyond physical discomfort. Psychological counseling to ease the trauma had became part of their lives.
"Emotionally, it almost destroyed me. I have to find a lot of strength just to cope with daily life. But, I still have a lot of fear and I have to learn to live with it," Hughes told the court.
Moreover, the survivors also had to deal with the financial ramification of their injuries.
McCartney had to retire from the sport he loved, Australian football, at the tender age of 29 and lose some A$150,000 (Rp 825 million) from his annual income.
Anstee, McCartney and Hughes were the last of the main witnesses presented by the prosecutors. So far, 59 witnesses have appeared in the trial. Amrozi's lawyers stated that they would not summon any witness to testify.
"None of the testimonies by the prosecutors' witnesses have incriminated our client in any way. In light of that fact we think that summoning witnesses to speak in favor of the defendant is unnecessary," the chief defense lawyer, Adnan Wirawan, said.
The trial will continue on June 30 to hear the prosecutors' sentence demand.
Earlier in the morning, in the first trial of Ali Gufron alias Mukhlas, prosecutor I Putu Indriati read the 30-page indictment against the defendant, who was allegedly the regional leader of the Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) terrorist network, which has been blamed for the Bali bombings.
Mukhlas is being charged with planning, organizing and committing an act of terrorism. Under the new terrorism law, the offenses carry the maximum penalty of death or life imprisonment.
The prosecutor also revealed that in 1987, during the war against Soviet Union's occupation of Afghanistan, the defendant had met Osama bin Laden, the elusive leader of the international terrorist group al-Qaeda, in the town of Joji.