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The Seventh Anniversary Ceremony Bali bombing victims


About 70 people held a joint prayer at the memorial on the site of the blasts in Kuta, Bali's main tourist strip where Islamist extremists detonated two bombs targeting packed night-spots in 2002.Memorial organiser Hayati Eka Laksmi, whose husband was killed in the blasts, said the service was an opportunity to "send a message for a peaceful Indonesia".People from 22 countries died in the massive explosions, including 88 Australians.

The anniversary came days after police killed two militants in the latest raid against Islamist networks blamed for Bali bombings and other attacks across the mainly Muslim archipelago.

Gatut Indro Suranto, who was only metres away from one of the bombs but somehow survived, said it was high time the Indonesian government cracked down on Islamists who glorified "holy war" and suicide bombers."To prevent such horrible incidents from happening to others, I think the government should focus its efforts on the recruitment of suicide bombers," the father-of-two said. "We may be able to topple their leaders, but not their young followers who have a deviant way of thinking."He was referring to the killing last month of Noordin Mohamed Top, a Malaysian fanatic who led a splinter group the Jemaah Islamiyah terror network blamed for the Bali attack among others. "If it continues, the threat of terrorist attacks will always haunt our life," Suranto said, urging the government to counter "wrong religious perceptions" propagated by Islamist radicals.One of Asia's most violent Islamist ideologues, Noordin was killed by police in a raid on a house in Central Java on September 17. Analysts say he knew of the planning for the 2002 Bali attacks but was not directly involved. Instead he was blamed for subsequent attacks including one against the Australian embassy in Jakarta in 2004, Bali again in 2005 and twin suicide blasts against the luxury hotels in Jakarta on July 17 this year.

Indonesia has killed or arrested hundreds of Jemaah Islamiyah militants since 2002, but two of the alleged Bali plotters - Dulmatin and Umar Patek - remain at large and are believed to be hiding in the southern Philippines.
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