Bali Bomber Sentenced to Death

The first Bali bombings suspect to stand trial was today sentenced to death for his role in the attacks.

Amrozi bin Nurhasyim, a 40-year-old mechanic who bought chemicals and a van used in the bombing, was found guilty of planning and helping to execute the bombings.

He had previously admitted to participating in the attacks, and became known as the "smiling bomber" for his lack of remorse and jocular manner. True to the epithet, he smiled when the court pronounced him guilty.

However, he remained expressionless and shifted in his chair when the judge read out the death sentence, which was handed down under Indonesia's newly enacted anti-terrorism laws.

Two bombs were detonated on the Kuta Beach nightclub strip in Bali on October 12 last year. The attacks killed 202 people, most of them foreign tourists.

Several of the alleged bombers said that they had picked the venue in order to kill as many westerners as possible. Their aim was to avenge the treatment of Muslims in other parts of the world.

"The accused is found guilty in a legal and convincing manner of carrying out an act of terrorism," said the judge, I Made Karna.

Hundreds of people, including survivors of the bombings, cheered when the judge read out the sentence.

Amrozi was arrested in November, when he was shown on television laughing and smiling with Indonesian police during a public interrogation. The footage sparked outrage in Australia, home to 88 of the victims.

As he was led out of the courtroom, Amrozi smiled broadly at Australian survivors, some of whom shouted back angrily.

The judge said that Amrozi had seven days to appeal against his sentence. Although Indonesian law allows for death sentences to be handed down, executions are, in practice, rare.

His was the first of at least 30 cases to come to trial. Three other defendants are currently facing the court in Denpasar, the Balinese capital.

If the Amrozi verdict is followed by similar convictions for other alleged bombers, the Indonesian judicial system will be boosted in its attempts to tackle militant Islamists and the al-Qaida-linked Jemaah Islamiyah group.

Apart from last October's attacks on the Sari club and Paddy's bar in Kuta Beach, the group is blamed for other bombings in Indonesia, as well as thwarted attacks on the US embassy and other western targets in Singapore.

Its alleged leader, Abu Bakar Ba'aysir, is on trial in Jakarta for treason.

Amrozi's sentence was handed down just two days after a suicide bomber drove a van loaded with explosives similar to those used in Bali into a US-run luxury hotel in Jakarta, killing at least 10 people.