November 10, 2008	Monday	Ziqa'ad 11, 1429

TENGGULUN (Indonesia), Nov 9: Hundreds of hardline Muslims, some chanting “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest), gathered for the funerals of three Indonesian militants executed on Sunday for the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings that killed 202 people.

The three men from the group Jemaah Islamiah — Imam Samudra, 38, Mukhlas, 48, and Amrozi, 46 — were executed by firing squad on Nusakambangan island in central Java shortly after midnight, a spokesman for the attorney-general’s office said.

The two explosions on Bali’s Kuta strip on Oct. 12, 2002 — one at Paddy’s Bar and the other at the Sari Club — killed 202 people including 88 Australians and 38 Indonesian citizens.

“They had to pay the ultimate price for what they did,” Peter Hughes, who suffered severe burns in the attacks, told Australia’s Channel Nine television. “These guys set about mass murder.”

Georgia Lysaght, another Australian who lost her 33-year-old brother Scott in the attacks, said that the executions would make little difference to how she felt.

“It isn’t going to bring Scott back and it isn’t going to change what happened,” she said.

In an interview late last year, the militants said their only regret was that some Muslims were killed.—Reuters