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Bali pays tribute to bombing victims

A woman weeps in front of the makeshift memorial at the former Sari club, one of the sites of bomb attacks in Kuta on Bali yesterday. PHOTO: REUTERS

Heads bowed and weeping, Australian and other survivors of last year's bomb attacks on Indonesia's Bali island and hundreds of grieving relatives paid tribute yesterday to the 202 people killed.

Voices from a choir of Australian and Indonesian school children drifted over the families at a Christian service on a limestone escarpment overlooking Kuta Beach, where Muslim militants blew up two nightclubs on this day a year ago.

Of 2,000 mourners at the service, about 800 were survivors and relatives, the majority from Australia, which lost 88 citizens in the worst act of terror since the Sept. 11, 2001, strikes on the US.

In all, 22 countries lost people.

For many, the emotion of returning to this fabled isle has been raw. But there has also been defiance.

"If we didn't come back they would have won. It goes to show they can't beat the Australian spirit. We'll keep on coming and sticking it up their face," said Jason Madden, 31, who lost seven friends from Perth's Kingsley Cats football team.

Australian Prime Minister John Howard and leaders from Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, were among those at the service, which was open to the public and attracted many who took part in rescue efforts last year.

Chief security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono vowed to fight terrorism and said Indonesia would never rest until it had caught all those behind the blasts. About 40 people have been captured and 20 sentenced, including three given the death sentence.

One of those on death row, Imam Samudra, said in an interview published yesterday that he had no regrets and was ready to die.

Indonesia has warned that Muslim militants were planning more attacks and had built two bombs but insisted the mainly Hindu enclave of Bali was safe for the mourners.

Heavily armed police and sniffer dogs were on patrol.

"These diabolical men and their brand of evil simply has no place in our society. They belong in our darkest dungeons, locked away deep beneath our children's playgrounds. History will condemn them forever," said Yudhoyono.

Across Australia, flags flew at half-mast as the country stopped to mark the anniversary.

On a windy cliff top overlooking Coogee beach in Sydney, 1,000 people gathered for the dedication of a memorial at the site renamed Dolphins Point after the Coogee Dolphins rugby league team, which lost six players.

Indonesia has blamed the blasts on Jemaah Islamiah, the Southeast Asian militant group linked to al-Qaeda. Security experts say it is only a matter of time before Jemaah Islamiah strikes again in Indonesia or elsewhere in the region.

In the sombre atmosphere of Bali's Garuda Wisnu Cultural Park, about 20 minutes drive from Kuta and bordered by towering limestone blocks, Australian military chaplain Richard Thompson gently urged families to try to accept their suffering.

"If we live as victims the terrorists have beaten us and we are in danger then of spending our future living in anger and frustration. Such a life lived in anger and frustration does not honor the memory of our loved ones," Thompson said.

A simple wooden cross stood behind the altar.

Some Australian footballers who lost friends in the attacks had the number 88 -- the number of Australian victims -- sewn onto jerseys. A few relatives clutched photos of loved ones.

The service ended with the singing of Waltzing Matilda, a much-loved Australian song written in the late 19th century.

Howard then went to the bomb site and placed a floral wreath at a memorial across the road from where the Sari Club once stood, and where the names of the 202 dead have been etched in gold letters on a stone tablet.

Up to 200 Australian tourists standing nearby burst into the sporting chant "Aussie Aussie Aussie, oi oi oi."

Other events will run during the day, finishing with a small Balinese ceremony at the bomb site at 11:08pm, the exact time that many holidays on this lush island paradise were brought to an end one year ago.

Many victims have been drawn to the site where the Sari Club was once a beacon to good times but is now a shrine, only to start sobbing, or to paste photos of dead loved ones on a board that stretches the length of the empty lot.

The site is awash with flowers and candles.

Indonesia is not making Oct. 12 a day of remembrance, saying such events have been held. President Megawati Sukarnoputri did not come for the ceremonies.
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