JP/4/polri

JP/4/polri

Bali gears up for third anniversary of 2002 bombings

The Jakarta Post
Jakarta

Police will launch a major security operation for the third
commemoration on Wednesday of the Oct. 12, 2002 bombings on the
resort island of Bali, which killed 202 people, mostly foreign
tourists.

Bali Police spokesman Sr. Com. A.S. Reniban said the operation
would involve some 3,000 security officers, including Balinese
security guards called pecalang.

"We will deploy some 1,500 police officers, assisted by
pecalang and military officers. So in total they will be around
3,000 personnel," Reniban said on Saturday.

Separately, National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. Soenarko was
quoted by Antara as saying his office was also increasing its
intelligence activities on the island ahead of the Oct. 12
commemoration.

The anniversary falls just 12 days after a second round of
bomb blasts in Bali, which killed at least 23 people, including
three suicide bombers, and injured more than 100 others.

The police are now working hard to identify the bombers and
have widened the hunt outside Bali for the masterminds of the
latest attack. However, no significant progress has been achieved
in the investigation a week after the incident.

Two suspected key players in both attacks, Malaysian fugitives
Noordin M. Top and Azahari bin Husin, are the main targets of the
intensive hunt.

Photos of the heads of the three suicide bombers, which
survived the blasts almost intact, have been widely circulated
but no one has identified them. Police say they are from a "new
generation" of attackers unknown to previously convicted
militants.

Reniban further said the police were tightening security in
every entrance point to Bali, including the Gilimanuk and Padang
Bai seaports and the Ngurah Rai International Airport.

Apart from that, he added, intelligence activities would also
be intensified at a number of tourist spots such as Kuta,
Jimbaran, Nusa Dua and Sanur.

Reniban said the island was ready for the commemoration.

He said people were generally feeling secure, including in the
recent celebration of Galungan, despite the fact that some places
were still deserted as some tourists had left the island.

Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer -- whose country
lost 88 people in the 2002 attacks and four on Oct. 1 -- will be
among those attending the commemoration event. Also present will
be other top national and foreign figures.

One ceremony will be held early on Wednesday at "Ground Zero"
-- the scene of the blasts in Legian, Kuta -- one in the morning
involving the visiting Australian dignitaries and another in the
late evening for the local community, Reniban said.

Bali's crucial tourism industry, severely devastated by the
2002 nightclub blasts, has suffered another setback following the
Oct. 1 attack.

Victims of the latest blasts are still recovering in hospital,
some with terrible wounds from the bombs, which were packed with
ball bearings and shrapnel to maximize death and injury.

Made Ardani, 22, was working as a waitress at the Menega cafe
in Jimbaran when the first bomb exploded.

She is recovering from surgery to remove metal pellets from
six different parts of her body.

"I am still feeling unwell. All I can think of is that those
bombers should be brought here and handed over to my relatives,"
Ardani was quoted by AFP as saying in Sanglah Hospital.