Bali bombers to seek Muslim edict on validity of penalty

THREE Islamic militants on death row for the 2002 Bali bombings met their families yesterday as their lawyer said they would seek an edict from Indonesia's Muslim body on the legality of execution by shooting.The three - Imam Samudra, Amrozi and Mukhlas - could face possibly a firing squad within a month unless they seek presidential clemency, an option which they have already ruled out.Last week, prosecutors handed over copies of a Supreme Court verdict rejecting the men's final appeal, marking the start of a 30-day deadline for them to request clemency or be executed.The three men were sentenced to death for their role in two nightclub blasts on Bali's Kuta strip on October 12, 2002, in which 202 people died, mostly foreign tourists.

The attacks were blamed on the South-East Asian militant group Jemaah Islamiah.Samudra's mother, wife and four children visited the men in prison on Nusakambangan island, off the southern coast of Java.Samudra's family travelled with the relatives of Amrozi and Mukhlas, accompanied by one of the men's lawyers, Achmad Michdan.Mr Michdan said the defence team was adamant in its rejection of the Supreme Court verdict on the grounds that the case review did not involve a retrial and re-examination of witnesses."We want the panel of judges who heard the case to be investigated, " Mr Michdan said.He said the Bali bombers' lawyers would lodge a request for the Supreme Court to hear the appeal case again.

The lawyers would also send a letter to the Indonesian Council of Ulema, the country's highest authority on Islam, asking it to issue a fatwa on the legality of execution by shooting.The three convicts have asked to be beheaded, rather than killed by firing squad.Previously, the bombers said in a statement read out by their lawyers, that if they were executed, their blood would "become the light for the faithful ones and burning hellfire for the infidels and hypocrites".

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