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  Face to face with the Bali bombers May 23, 2004 Reporter :Sarah Ferguson Producer : Peter Hiscock  It's been 19 months since Australians became victims of Osama Bin Laden's war against the West and the Bali bombers are unrepentant. This week, Sunday's Sarah Ferguson comes face to face with the Bali bombers and examines Indonesia's terrorist network from the inside. And in pictures never shown before on Australian television, we'll see terrorist training camps in Indonesia, where Arab instructors sent by al-Qaeda teach the next generation of killers and point them at the West. We'll watch those recruits on their first mission burning a Christian village to the ground.We also learn how they become graduates in the school of terror. As the mastermind of the Bali bombing, Mukhlas, puts it, "There are thousands of them. I don't think there's any way that Bush can finish them all off ... it's impossible!" Mukhlas tells Sunday, "It was true jihad and the impact on Bush and his cronies was incredible. It shook the world." His younger brother, the so-called "smiling assassin" Amrozi, said "I was really happy when it happened, why wouldn't I be?" Their hatred of Australia is undiminished, in particular of John Howard. Mukhlas says "If John Howard appears before me, I'll butcher him." In a recent statement, al-Qaeda put Australians at the top of their hit list in Indonesia. The key question is do they have the capacity and the will to strike again? The answer is yes, if you believe Mukhlas. "America and Australia and the rest only understand the language of force, the language of bombs, there's no use for the law." Police say their leader is the hardline Islamic cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, who helped convince the terrorists that they killed in God's name. As Bashir faced re-arrest on new terrorism charges, Sarah Ferguson went to see him in his Jakarta prison. His spokesman helped fit the compulsory headscarf on Sarah, before smuggling her in. She had to keep the camera low, to keep it out of sight of the prison guards. He tells her that he's not the leader of Jemaah Islamiyah and the police have no evidence. But the police say they do have new evidence from captured members of JI that Bashir authorised the Bali bombs.  At first, Bashir's former pupil Mukhlas refused to talk to Sarah because she was a Western woman, but he eventually did, because he had a message for Australians. "I want the Australians to understand why I attacked them. It wasn't because of their faults, it was because of their leader's faults. Don't blame me, blame your leader who is on Bush's side. Why? Because in Islam there is a law of revenge." We also hear from both the JI members themselves and the head of Indonesian Intelligence, General Abdullah Hendropriyono, that the war in Iraq is creating new terrorists. And at police headquarters in Bali, Brigadier General Sudarsono says the Bali bombers still at large could threaten Australian lives. "They won't necessarily strike on Australian soil, but they might hit Australian interests within their reach ... not just Australian people. Australia has a lot of interests, airline companies, and it has industry in south-east Asia." And if the continuing threat makes us afraid, Mukhlas claims success. For that, he says, is a victory for terrorism. "In Australia, why would they want to guard the harbours and the railways? This is a curse from God that they be afraid of their own shadow. Just imagine, people are scared of their own shadows. It's the victory of the terrorists!" A report not to be missed. Click here to read a transcript of this story |
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