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Stop aid to Indonesia: Bali victim
A Victim of the 2002 Bali bombings has urged Australia to stop aid to Indonesia in protest against moves to further reduce the jail term of radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir.Erik de Haart, a spokesman for Sydney's Coogee Dolphins rugby league club which lost six players in the terrorist attack, said the recommended 30-day remission for Bashir was disgusting. Mr de Haart, who was standing outside Bali's Sari Club when the 2002 attack occurred, said the Australian Government should immediately withdraw aid to Indonesia unless it guaranteed not to reduce Bashir's jail term. In the aftermath of the latest bombings in Bali this month, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer announced a $1 million aid package. "It p****s me off that the Indonesians treat us like this," Mr de Haart said. "The Government needs to protest in the strongest terms possible â if they want to treat us with disrespect, we should hold the aid back. "Give it to Laos or Cambodia or countries that will respect us and can use it. "This shows how little respect Indonesia has, not only for the people that died, but for Australians in general." An Indonesian Justice Ministry source said today prison authorities had requested a 30-day remission for Bashir to mark the end of the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan next week. By tradition in Indonesia, the sentences of thousands of convicted inmates are reduced as part of religious celebrations. If approved by Justice Hamid Awuluddin as expected, the remission would mean that Bashir, the alleged spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiah, which is blamed for the 2002 Bali blasts, the October 1 bombings and a string of other attacks, would walk free in May next year. The Australian Government has repeatedly protested against moves to reduce Bashir's sentence but Mr de Haart said it had not tried hard enough. "Their efforts have been crap," he said. "It really saddens me and it embarrasses me: the stance that Alexander Downer takes. He's not strong enough in complaining to them." He said stronger protests might not change the minds of the Indonesians, but Australia should show it is angry about the move and does not want to see it happen again, "not stand back and take it". Posted by: God Save The World AKA Oztralian 2005-10-26 |
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