CANBERRA, Nov 14 (Reuters) - Australians were outraged on Thursday by images of a happy, joking Bali bomber confessing to police in Indonesia, condemning the smile of the Indonesian as proof the bombers were "bloodthirsty" and "sneering" people.
Posted on 11/13/2002 7:17:39 PM PST by Dallas
CANBERRA, Nov 14 (Reuters) - Australians were outraged on Thursday by images of a happy, joking Bali bomber confessing to police in Indonesia, condemning the smile of the Indonesian as proof the bombers were "bloodthirsty" and "sneering" people.
Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer lashed out at the images of the smiling, waving bomber -- televised across Australia and splashed across front pages -- as "ugly images"
that would distress relatives of the nearly 200 people killed.
"I looked at him on television this morning, you know laughing and joking and waving, and I think to myself, how would I feel if one of my children, or another one of my family members or a loved one had been killed?" Downer told reporters.
"I think these people are so bloodthirsty. Their sort of ugly, sneering, amused attitude at the slaughter of innocent people, it's just horrific that there are people like that."
A fresh-faced Indonesian man identified only as Amrozi smiled and waved at reporters on Wednesday as he admitted being one of the Bali bombers. He told police of his delight at the attacks and said he went sightseeing in the days before the blasts.
Wearing police-issue shorts and a blue T-shirt with the word "detainee" splashed across his back, Amrozi looked relaxed as more than 100 reporters and cameramen watched the national police chief question the prime suspect in the attack.
Most of the more than 180 killed in the October 12 nightclub bombings on the Indonesian resort island of Bali were holidaying foreigners, and up to 90 were Australians.
Australian opposition leader Simon Crean described Amrozi's public interrogation as bizarre and insensitive.
Indonesian police chief General Da'i Bachtiar told reporters after the interrogation that Amrozi was not in Bali when the bombs exploded in the famous Kuta Beach tourist district. Amrozi had already gone back to his home village in East Java, he said.
"After he was there, he heard on the radio there had been a bomb explosion in Bali. He said he felt delighted that his bomb had successfully exploded in Bali," Bachtiar said.
Bachtiar gave the fullest account yet of the events leading up to the explosions on October 12, which have been tied to Jemaah Islamiah, a militant Southeast Asian Muslim group that has been linked to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda.
He also named four additional suspects in the hunt for the bombers. That brought to seven the number of named suspects, including Amrozi, out of 10 Indonesians police have been hunting.
Amrozi is the only one arrested so far.
Amrozi, the Javanese mechanic accused of the Bali bombings, waves to the media in Denpasar. Seated is Indonesian national police chief Dai Bachtiar. Photo: Kate Geraghty
(Is it just me or is it disgusting that other people are smiling in the background, the cop and the man and woman directly behind the perp?)
Good! Now, if their outrage will just last...
This is just further proof of how much value the third world countries have for human life/suffering.
:CLUE: not all people in the world are like us...really.
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